Harry Potter and Along Came Shadows
by Shadow of Nexus
Summary: AU/ Time Travel/ OCs/ FemHarry What if Harry Potter took that train, died, only to be reborn once more to right wrongs and maybe experience a different type of love story? An experiment into the Isekai genre where Harry attempts to become a true leader of what could've been a world wide war.
1. Twilight Shadows

**Harry Potter and Along Came Shadows**

** Chapter 1: Twilight Shadows Part I**

I like to call it want-to-be-black: what's supposed to be the blackest black isn't really black it looks green, red and blue-ish white at the same time; almost like closing your eyes and seeing those dots and specks. Well not only was I staring into that weird dark abyss, I _felt_ like that abyss; suspended, weightless like I was out in space, and no immediate feeling of any arms or legs and time ceased with no shortage of what felt like static electricity flowing through me.

"What's going on? Why am I here?" I shout to the darkness but what came out was but a whisper.

"I wonder Mr. Potter. Why indeed are you here?" A disembodied voice said. The voice was light barely a whisper as well.

"I uhh. I took the second train…" That was the last thing I remembered; talking to the old bright profile of Dumbledore before being shipped off to god knows where. "Who are you?" I add.

"You should stop asking for the "what" in life Mr. Potter and start looking for the "why's", you'll find life starts becoming more interesting that way. As for the why I am, that's a story later down the road." The voice sounded as lovely as a harp with each delicate word a blessing from a heavenly song. It paused waiting for an answer from me. I couldn't tell the intentions or motivations of whatever the thing in front or rather around me was, yet I was feeling unlike anything I have ever felt before: content and free.

"Stories happen to good people where bad things occur. Good stories happen when those good people overcome those bad things. Or learn from them. What do you think about stories?"

"I think I'd love any sort of story that lets me have a good life."

"Well some would say you did have that type of story, Mr. Potter just a matter of recognizing when bad starts being good. I wonder… since we're here for a while, mind if I ask some questions?"

"Where is here, if you don't mind?"

"It's called… the Nexus an Information Highway and space time and pretty much everything else passes through here. Once, twice, three and even all at the same time and then also never ever meeting. You know what a black hole is? It's almost exactly like that."

"Umm… no. I'm uhh more into spells and charms, you know… wizard stuff."

"Oh, me too."

"Akashic Addendum: Sage Unlocked," a female voice said.

"Interesting…," he said before I can ask what that was, "Tell me Mr. Potter if you could go back to the beginning of your life and relive it all… would you?"

I thought for a while. Would I? Life seemed so unnecessarily harsh. Despite having lived a life that most normal people would only dream of; a world dominated by magic unseen, being targeted by what people would describe as evil incarnate was a drawback. Is that worth going back to?

"I took the train because I didn't want to be there any longer. I appreciate what I've gone through don't get me wrong but I didn't have a normal life then, I'm not going to have one now. I was tired of the fighting and backstabbing, tired of seeing people killed and all this after winning the war. I want this... pain to end. I want to see what happens when it does end."

"I see…" was all the voice could muster. After a long pause it continued with renewed vigour. "Well Mr. Potter this is what happens when it ends. We see the universe in this form blind as bats. All information is passed and stored here as all information is also at the same time lost."

"Lost?" I ask.

"When all information is subjected to the force of infinite gravity then things start to grow… let's say dark. Even light would have trouble passing mediums if such mediums were packed as such. Darkness is a thing to behold however, a solution therefore is to release those holds on mediums for energies to run and try to make sense of things. Life would otherwise be astronomically boring."

"What you're saying is…" I felt- something, the influx of otherworldly power and knowledge came into my being before I can finish the sentence. A light flew into me solid as ice and it's magic starting to work. Then I started to understand: I knew everything before I can even think about it. Knowledge, all knowledge, came at me at the speed of thought like reading a stop sign but not really reading the full word on the octagon but knowing having to stop… at the speed of light but multiplied by infinity.

"You can call me Warden. Are you ready for a good story Mr. Potter?"

I sat in space as dumbfounded as I think you can be at my collected intelligence. That at once I knew my answer, color started to come back emerging right above me. The want-to-be-black slowly swallowing and squeezing me whole from what I guessed to be my head down to my toes as a bright white light poured over me. How warm and forgiving this sensation was I thought. I couldn't look up however, the light too bright, my _body_ was being lost again like a dream fading behind the back of your mind.

"Yes, give me a good story," I whispered pleadingly, I was scared and excited for I knew what was happening. I was being reborn and squeezed out into existence once more, "A love story!" I yelled before the nothingness of the light which overtook me but not before a chuckle was the last thing I remembered before hearing my own cries for air.

A good story… even with all my infinite knowledge I had… what is a _good story_? I asked myself. Indeed… _why a good story?_

As I hear my crying I became immediately aware of how stark naked I was. I also couldn't see very well. Or move very well either. Not for a lack of trying my limbs felt… stubby. Any knowledge I had gained evaporated as soon I came about, a voice softly whispering to me in my head, "Normal vessels are incapable of holding immense knowledge for too long, whatever you gained at the Nexus will be gone to come back gradually. But all your memories before the transference of the sage data will remain including any new ones."

One day I was able to open my eyes. I was in a blanket, incapable of movement. A young lady in a Nun's garb came by to pick me up feeding me my morning slop.

"Choo choo, in you get," the lady cooed. I obliged her spoon and ate the goop. Yuck. But like not at the same time, I had no teeth and it tasted fine texture was just weird.

"Tanya how's Harry?" Another lady in Nun's garb asked.

"Oh, he's just wonderful Anna! Never met a more well mannered boy. And such beautiful green eyes," she gushed.

The days became shorter with each hour of the day being spent fed and taken care of by Sister's Anna and Tanya, I had gathered quite a bit of information while I was here. I resided in the Saint Claire's Children's Home and Orphanage. A rather large area where foster children and orphans live in rather peaceful accommodations. The Orphanage is directly run by the Sister's of Waverly Circle. A rather eccentric group of nuns who had taken specific vows to protect and care for the youngest in need. All of this was new to me, again I had been born without knowing my parents (nothing new but still unfortunate) at least I didn't have to live with the Dursleys.

At night I shared my sleeping space with other babies, two others in fact. While most nights were good the sound of screaming would fill the night awakening me in a grumpy stupor. Other nights I'd be the one awakening finding my nether regions either wet or soiled. I decided instead of crying I would simply try my hardest to call out for Tanya and Anna. However with my baby mouth still too small and under used the only sounds that come out are Ah ah and Ta ah. I like to think the Sisters appreciated that I didn't rip their heads off as soon as they got to me. I would just stare at the beautiful complexions of Anna and Tanya.

Anna was a redhead whose hair fell to her waist when she didn't have her garb on, with a slender frame she was quite the busy body always performing cleaning duties. Tanya on the other hand was younger and blonde with big blue eyes. She performed several church duties during the day if she didn't help around with the babies. I had numerous other Sisters but they were my favourites as I was sure I was theirs. The best days were seeing them both together playing with me and reading me stories. They weren't fussy like the other nuns who would, I felt, rather do anything but clean up messy diapers. Tanya and Anna were great caregivers doting on every baby but having a soft spot for me. Always giving me attention and holding me close to their hearts, I couldn't imagine being anywhere better.

Tanya and Anna were best friends. One day I overheard them telling each other everything about their lives before they took their vows. Tanya had grown up in Germany. Before the age of thirty she felt her six figure job and fancy homes just didn't feel right to her. That an uneasiness had taken a hold of her was warranted, (and I have lived with the Dursleys a price of higher status in today's society meant putting up a facade one that meant being untrue to oneself and sacrificing certain freedoms.) In Tanya's case relinquishing people of their homes. Not being able to stomach the act of foreclosure on homes and businesses Tanya left the business world and donated everything she ever owned to at risk women and children. She then left for Saint Claire's when she had finished a mission to Asia and seeing the many destitute, a lot being children, had decided to take up the vow.

Anna had a similar upbringing having grown up originally in the United States however. There she met and fell in love with a British man named Mark. She was an English and French teacher and he was a sailor. Eventually Anna and Mark married and moved to England where they sought to create a family. Anna and Mark however were unlucky to say the least. Numerous still births had Anna distraught and Mark a once bubbly and happy man a shell of his former self. They both had lost any confidence of a happy marriage and called it quits deciding it was for the better. Anna went throughout Europe, depressed, but trying to grow and continue despite the tragedy. She went on teaching for schools in Spain and Portugal as English was a popular in demand job there. That was when she had been found by Saint Claire's Director of Operations while on vacation. There Director Tory explained Saint Claire's and Anna immediately fell in love with the project. Anna was deeply religious praying to God every day and night for her babies that she lost. Even now after she got us into bed she would bless us and ask God for protection.

These women were the closest thing to a mother I never had but couldn't wish for any better other than my own. And I found myself crying for the both of them. Even though I was still a baby my mind was that of my former self. Memories of my past self were shifting back and forth and however memories of wandless and wordless magic stuck in my mind. Everyday I looked inward into my barely developed magic core to find ways to perform any sort of miracle even small ones. Anna had gotten a rose in a vase and had placed it beside my crib when I had gotten a brilliant idea. One flick of my finger and presto-magico I flew a charm that made it impervious to decay. Baffled the ladies thought it was a godsend. Eventually when they had started bringing others to see it I decided to lift the charm much to the dismay of the excited Sisters.

I did find other ways to mess- I mean entertain- the Sisters. Every once in a while I was being carried around the grounds we would be taken to the garden a run down little thing no one really had time to care for especially the flowers or grass. So I flew a little spell to help the plants grow. That same day Tanya took me into the kitchen to find me a bottle. Perfect I thought. Meat had been a rare commodity in the Children's home. Or well food in general. I sent a transfiguration spell to multiply the food whilst Tanya's back was turnt. When she came about she agaped to find so many ingredients that weren't there the second before. She shook her head in disbelief and left the kitchen thinking maybe she was simply not paying attention. The cooks couldn't explain the increased food and everyone else simply thought God had blessed them. Whenever I did that the Saint Claire's would be a lot more jolly.

I would do this any time I was picked up. Moving from room to the other I'd cast a room cleaning charm. Diapers would clean themselves. Potatoes peeled and washed. Cracks in walls repaired. At one point some of the Sisters thought a demon had inhabited the buildings. The director took command of the situation and merely explained that all the things that had happened were nice and thoughtful. That these were acts of an Angel meant to help carry our burdens and that we should honor these blessings. Eventually everyone took these surprising acts to be nothing more of someone working hard for no reason other than to be helpful if only to calm the nerves.

But Tanya was a smart cookie; she started to get the feeling weird things occurred at the places I have been. She had started watching me for anything unusual. I made sure to only throw out spells when I was on her shoulder. She became flabbergasted but never afraid. Like a little girl curious about who's been placing candy in odd places.

"You're a little miracle aren't you," she would ask while changing me to my pjs. I felt like she was expecting me to make out words like a grown man. I would just tilt my head and make a goo goo sound and snippets of gah gahs and by the one high brow stare she gave me I couldn't help but laugh inside. Eventually she gave up and gave me a raspberry. God I hate those.

I observed my body was much more sensitive to bright imagery and often I was drawn to sensations in my mouth. I would find myself often literally with my foot in my mouth without knowing.

"You know. It'd be cool if you turned this water into wine," Anna chuckled as she drank from her cup. Amused I quickly did so. Her eyes widened looking back and forth from me and the cup. "No," she whispered, "Communion! Yes. Communion wine that's it! I got to lay off this stuff," I couldn't help but chuckle at her baffled mutterings as she went to dump the wine out the window.

Of course my baby hijinks didn't just end at the Sisters and kitchen supplies. Whenever a baby was wailing profusely I would send a charm of lullaby to calm my neighbours. If that didn't work then a quick vanishing spell aimed at their diapers was in order. I often used it on myself up until I was able to feel my puckerhole. By that time my legs had started to have better motor skills and I was kicking everyday as much as I can. I had a plan set up and I wasn't going to waste a minute of it enjoying the baby vacation life. Or so I thought.

By my first "birthday" it was customary for everyone at Saint Claire's to celebrate with me. The cooks put out a small feast, the other babies were dressed in party hats, the cooks were invited and Director Tory was there as well. I even got a cake. When my Sisters brought it out I couldn't do anything but stare at it. Everyone had gotten worried when I started to shed a tear but no crying came out of me. Of course I was already known as the baby who didn't ever cry but this was only because of everyone's ignorance to my actual maturity. This time though I couldn't help it. My… family was celebrating and I mean ACTUALLY celebrating my birthday. It was different from when the Weasleys and Hermione and everyone else did it, but I remember my last life's first 10 years as being truly awful experiences. Times when all I would get were Dud's handy downs, let alone a cake… and never even a crack of a smile

I laughed suddenly which I think made everyone even more worried, but imagining from their perspective I think I would've been a little freaked out over the silent crying then laughing baby too. I once again became a baby becoming animated and pointing and giggling at the cake. This put everyone at ease.

Directory Tory a lovely little woman spectacled with wispy graying hair came up to my side and said, "Time to blow out your candle. And wish for something nice Harry."

I closed my eyes and did exactly that, "Please, please keep this going," I thought to myself. I readied up a spell, a simple breeze spell that'd blow it out for me. I timed it with the Director who ended up inhaling some air and just as she exhaled I performed it.

I gave it a few months before I started walking not wanting to seem too freaky a child. Afterwards I started talking using mostly nouns, my first words were of course going to be Tanya and Anna. A clearly good choice as they all together screamed in unison when I said both names.

I was reading high school books and by one and a half I was walking and running, using the loo all by myself. My magic flowing through me helping whenever I faced a road block (or getting stuck in the toilet) I was simply biding my time, I knew this wasn't going to last. A year and then another and I was the fastest growing and most accelerated child at Saint Claire's. Saint Claire's was very interested in my development often having me take tests and meet with numerous talented Mothers and Sisters who taught me things like the piano, science, and math. It was all rudimentary at first like two plus two equals four but when I started to do algebra things quickly escalated. Boy did I _absorb _knowledge: engineering and sciences were the big ones; quantum physics, anatomy, robotics and music stuff of nightmares became a breeze.

Director Tory thought Saint Claire's had gained a prodigy. At age four numerous schools had sent scholars and teachers to meet Saint Claire's tiny genius. All of them offered to provide housing for me. But I refused throwing tantrums and saying I wanted to spend time with my friends and be adopted the normal way but never pushing it too far. Fortunately Saint Claire's was under no obligation to give me up to anyone. Director Tory was also very capable in her position. She knew if I stayed longer more resources and donors would visit simply to hear me play the piano or to check on my progress with math and science with each visit a showing of my growing intellect.

Normally I wouldn't know any of these. I mean had trouble doing simple ingredients for potions class but when I was two I had learnt that the Nexus had given me an "upgrade." A sort of cheat code. It was called Sage Mode. The concept was simple. I would play with an instrument or read a book and my understanding of said item or concept would unlock in this memory bank of mine called the Akashic Library. Along with the Akashic Library I also gained an assistant of sorts called Ahri. Ahri explained the Akashic Library to me.

"Everything you do, everything you play, read about, or experience will be skills unlocked in the Library. This will help streamline your story progression in an efficient and meaningful manner. You'll be allowed to excel and refer back to prior experiences."

So in a way I was given the ability to learn things quickly, memorize things quickly, and most importantly understand things. Sage Mode proved to be already very useful. Between my prior memories and the ability to learn everything I couldn't help but be giddy at the thought of this new life. I was starting to live in a fantasy, you know… despite having lived in one already, a fantasy within a fantasy if you will. But as quickly as everything seemed to be going, reality hit and it hit hard...

**A/N: I'm not an experienced writer, I'm just someone with a bit of time on their hands. This story idea of mine has been stuck in my head for a very long time and needs a release. I hope you enjoy despite my pacing.**


	2. In the Beginning, There was Light

**Twilight Shadows Part II**

I was completely unaware of how this world worked, you see, nothing so far matched my former life. Perhaps I wasn't truly Harry James Potter anymore. Harry yes, but Harry Saint Claire. Did I have a different father and mother? Had Voldemort even lived in this timeline? The scar on my head ceased to be and concentrating on my horcrux connection I had found out it became a distant memory. I had so many questions as I speculated on the ramifications of being born again and had no true means of finding out any answers. Yet. I needed to leave and find answers but on my own. I needed to search, if not me, for the one Voldemort would choose to be "the Chosen One." My best bet would be Neville Longbottom. He was as Dumbledore had put it, the only other person Voldermort would have ever had chosen had my parents not been there as well.

I was blissfully unaware of the outside world, Saint Claire's had no televisions or radios we were much further out from society. And while Saint Claire's had books and a library oddly enough newspapers were hard to come by. I had asked the Sisters if they could find any for me and when they asked why I even would want that I simply stated I was curious about the outside. Typically any one would find a four year old requesting newspapers as odd but the Sisters thought I was eccentric and that I was incessantly always on the lookout for more information and knowledge. They obliged to find me some but they had work and they weren't always outside of the orphanage to grab the paper.

It became closer to the month of May and that meant one more day closer to an Adoption Fair. Director Tory made it a habit of seeking me out beforehand to inquire my feelings no doubt. This time I was going to one hundred percent be ready to be adopted.

"How are you doing Harry?" She asked grandmotherly in one of our sessions. Every time I see her one more strand of gray hair would find its way to her head.

"I'm fine Miss Tory. I was just curious if could get more newspapers. Reading can be quite dull sometimes and I love the comic strips."

She gave me an inquisitive look before smiling, "Of course, we'll try getting you some. You know you've been becoming quite... quiet lately Harry. I've been meaning to ask, I heard from Sisters Tanya and Anna you want to be at the Kid's Fair? Do you feel ready to be adopted?"

I've been holding off on being adopted for a while. Everytime an institution or family inquired about me Director Tory was very clear I was not allowed to be processed that way especially because of the high volume of askers. No, if a family was to adopt me, it'd have to be at the Fair. Even then only if I was comfortable with the family. Most adopters were foreigners and I had to ensure that I stayed in the area. It was easy enough to do my selections however, I simply said I didn't like them, acted uncomfortable, and in which case Director Tory standing by very closely would list them as undesirable.

"I wanted you to know I think we may have found a family fit for you Harry. I want you to meet them at the next Fair and give them a chance okay?"

"Yes Ma'am."

"Harry?" a childish boy came up with a girl in tow right behind.

"Hi Ezra! Hello Erin."

"Hi Harry," the shy Erin replied.

Ezra and Erin Andrews were twins about a year older than me. Known to be quite gifted too and very mature for their ages they were inseparable as well as being my former crib mates (now we're bunk mates.) They were still children and so still slurred their words but beyond that they had amazing comprehension levels. Ezra was a busy body always giggling and smiling, it was his signature touch. He also loved lessons and soaked information quite fast as well. While I can see him growing up to be an athlete he was quite studious often found drawing and reading books with Erin or even reading to Erin.

Erin on the other hand was the opposite personality wise from Ezra. She was shy and hid behind her brother. She was comfortable enough to stick around me during times her brother went out to play but if she had a choice she'd always be behind her brother. Between the two she was by far the smarter one. She reminded me of Hermione, while Ezra enjoyed books, it was Erin you could always find in the library. She would often times recite poems and plays for us before bed time the only time she would come out of her shell. We all became quick friends although conversions often were one side towards me. However, I appreciated their ability to ask me questions whenever they didn't understand something.

"What're you doing Harry?" Ezra asked.

"Well… we should be getting dressed for the Fair. It'll be coming up soon."

"Oh come on Harry! We can play before that, Sister Beatrice said so," Ezra said excitedly.

I sighed, "Only for a little bit…" I said bemused. I didn't really have a problem playing I just knew Ezra didn't like Fairs and wanted to delay going.

"What game should we play Sissa?" Ezra asked Erin.

"It should be a game that Harry doesn't always win."

To be fair I was a dirty cheater. At hide and seek I could use disillusion on myself if I was a hider and if I was the seeker I could use the clairvoyance charm to find hiders. It was pretty funny. It also worked for Sardines.

"Conkers?" Ezra asked.

"No. Harry always wins." True… I've made my nut indestructible but only because a boy named Lee was on a winning streak and let power go to his head..

"How about a game of chess?" I suggested.

"NO!" They exclaimed in unison.

"Fair enough…" I said defeated. "I got one! How about rock paper scissors?"

"No more time for play," Sister Remelda quipped behind the door to our room, "the Fair is soon you all need to get dressed now."

"Sister Beatrice said we could play!" Ezra fussed.

"That was then, this is now. Go get ready and put on your uniform."

Ezra groaned all the way to his trunk. Sister Remelda helped Erin into her dress and I finished putting my own stuff on gad I didn't actually have to go through a game.

All the boys and all the girls were lined up at the hallway excited for what was to come.

"Do you think we'll be adopted today Ezra?" Erin asked. She was draped on his side as if holding on for dear life while she had her bunny doll Emma on her other arm.

"ERIN! Those parents are gonna take one look at us and will be fawning FAWNING I SAY!" I chuckled to myself. Always so optimistic I thought to myself.

Erin giggled and for once put on a smile. "This time! This time someone will get us!" She said just as enthusiastically. "How about you Harry? I bet you have lots of parents come to you."

I looked over to the twins. They were cute, highly desirable for adoption, if only for their defensive behavior while being confronted by parents these two would've left Saint Claire's years ago. These twins were identical except Erin had longer hair. They were taller children but often mistaken, I'm sure, for older ones which made it harder for them. They both were gifted with honey blonde hair that complimented their darker skin tones. Both had heterochromia which I thought made them even more unique as their left eye were a honey brown and their right eye bright green.

"Oh. I don't know yet. We'll see," in fact I wasn't certain yet by a long mile if today woud be any better than the others. Figuring out parents was tricky. On the one hand I was a cute adorable child, way more likely to be chosen than the older kids which I found unfortunate. But on the other Director Tory likes to stick by me often vetting parents. I find she likes pairing me with better off couples. Each one so far that I've met having smug faces and that same facade that the Dursleys have when in the presence of company. And when there is a suitable candidate they're usually foreigners, citizens of different countries as far off as the United States. Nothing against the foreigners, I'd say a good nine out of ten were very nice, however, a lot of them seemed the type to adopt a European child simply for the accent. An atrocious reason to adopt a child, I thought. Besides I had to remain here, I needed to grow up and get to Hogwarts.

Parents were left out in large canopies and tents under which toys were placed for the children. They were encouraged to meet and find possible children they'd be interested in getting to know better. They would then write their names down for later meetings. Food had been placed on benches inside a gazebo all were welcome to it and it had been my first stop.

"Harry these are the parents that I told you about. I thought you'd like to meet," Director Tory said.

I was stuffing my face with sausage when I looked around to find something _truly_ incredible.

"Mr. Granger and Mrs. Granger this is Harry St. Claire. Do you want to say hello Harry?"

Perhaps I heard her wrong but as soon as I looked up it was confirmed. Or so I thought. I quickly rationalized it as something else. But wait maybe they just looked like them- or perhaps Hermione isn't their daughter anymore-

"Oh! And this is Hermione." A girl with big brown almond eyes, lots of frizzy bushy brown hair, and rather large front teeth appeared behind the Grangers.

I was gobsmacked, incredulous that Hermione was here in the flesh. Immediately my head started spinning. _She's here!_

But… Hermione was an only child before, _why_ were they here?

"Hello… I'm… Harry." _Oh God_. I can't believe I'm doing this, I thought to myself. This was it! These were the perfect people I knew I had to get to adopt me. I couldn't mess this up. I thought of something, I didn't know if it would work.

"You have very pretty hair Hermione." _Bloody hell Harry why would you say that?_

She looked at me blankly, paused for a second, and then tugged at her father's arm. "Daddy, I like him." _Huh. That worked out._

Her father smiled and looked back at Mrs. Granger for a moment. "Well that's wonderful darling. Maybe you and Harry can talk for a bit? I'm just going to have a word with Ms. Tory here."

Hermione nodded. As the adults went off to find a suitable corner Hermione came closer to me. "Do you like to read books? Daddy and mummy have a whole collection at home almost like their very own library! Do you know how to read?"

"Yes," I replied. "I read every day. Well when I can," I said.

"What's your favorite subject? Mine is history."

"The same actually."

"That's just splendid! Mummy says we can learn a lot from history. I've read articles and encyclopedias about all sorts of periods. There was this one book…"

She continued on about this for a good amount of time, Classic Hermione I thought. It was the discussion on tenth century Europe that had her really going (of course it did.) Having her talk in front of me made me realize how much I missed her. Often I would just beam and look at little Hermione educating me about mistreatment of women back when people thought witches were real. (Give it some time Hermione I chuckled to myself.) When the adults came back Mr. Granger had to unglue Hermione from my waist.

"I'm sorry Harry, she's usually not like this."

"It's okay Mr. Granger, we were just discussing treatment of suspected witches in the tenth century."

"Daddy, you would never tie me up in a bag and throw me in a lake if you found out I was a witch, would you?" Hermione asked.

"Of course not darling! I think if you were a witch I would know. No there's much better way for that. Maybe throw you in the lion encampment at the zoo, but never in a lake we wouldn't want to pollute the environment."

Hermione looked at me apologetically. "Daddy likes to think he's funny, I promise he's smart."

"I'm right here!"

"Dad if Harry is going to become my new brother he needs to know that we're a good family."

Mr. and Mrs. Granger had looked incredulously at Hermione.

"Hermione do you mind if we got to talk to Harry for a moment?" Mrs. Granger asked.

Hermione frowned, but ultimately nodded her head. She looked as if she was about to cry and then startled me when tears started falling. "I hope… you find it in your hearts to know I like Harry. He likes my hair… and he listened to me talk about history. History Daddy! You told me that's what a good brother does!"

I didn't know how to react. My body was numb and I couldn't think of else other than how precious she had looked. The realization of everything that was happening to me started to imbed itself in my bones. I'm an orphan… Did Hermione's parents try to find her a sibling when she was younger… and fail?

Hermione's parents immediately went in to comfort Hermione and Hermione stiffened to their touch.

"Oh my Darling. We think he's a wonderful boy! We just wanted to ask him if he wanted to join our little family, that's all," Mrs. Granger said softly.

Hermione stopped crying and looked up at her parents. "Really?"

"Yes of course. But we have to ask him first okay?" Her father pulled his daughter up. Hermione nodded. "Here we'll go down here and have a bit of food okay?"

Director Tory having been watching from a few meters away had come to check to see if I had made another couple's child cry. It wouldn't have been the first time…

Mrs. Granger told her what had happened.

"Aww… Harry Ms. Granger has taken a liking to you. How do you feel about it?" Director Tory asked.

"I don't ever want to see her cry like that anymore. I want to be her brother. I'm going to protect her from everything and anything!"

The Director and Mrs. Granger looked at each other.

"Do you mind if we sit Harry?"

They led me to a bench on the gazebo. Mrs. Granger sat beside me and Director Tory remained standing.

"Harry… Mr. and Mrs. Granger have been trying very hard to find… a suitable sibling for Hermione," the Director said.

"Only a lot of the other children are…" Mrs. Granger started.

"Dense?" I finished. "I know they can be quite mean… I can be too. A lot of us do want to be adopted you know… it's just when a parent comes up you don't often know what to do. Or what to say except hello and hope for the best."

"Right!" Mrs. Granger said, "it can be very difficult finding someone that appreciates Hermione as much as her dad and I do."

"I can tell you right now Mrs. Granger. I think I love Hermione. She needs a brother!"

Mrs. Granger with the biggest of smiles a dentist would love to have looked about ready to cry herself.

I sat on the windowsill of the windmill. My heart was aching looking out to the farthest reaches of the prairies and the beyond of the horizons where a sun got ready to depart for the night.

I reached down to my wand and brought it out to feel the cold breeze. I let it slip out of my hand watching it tumble to the ground.

"Well Mr. Potter. I ask how are you feeling?" a voice raspy and cold was behind me.

I looked to where I thought it was. A shrouded figure in the shadows of the mill. I felt no ill will from it.

"Life is different…" I said.

"It always is. Imagine all the things that happen to us that you really never get to see. Well we can imagine but we can never be sure. Not until it happens right in front of us."

"Who are you?" I asked.

"Don't get too hung up Mr. Potter. Everything will make more sense…. When you start asking for _why's._"

Then it hit me. No, literally something hit me and I started to fall backwards from the window. That was when I woke up startled.

"Harry? Are you okay?" a sleepy child said from across the room.

"Yes Hermione… I'm sorry I didn't mean to wake you," I said slowly gasping for air.

Hermione got up from bed, rubbing her eyes she started walking towards me. She brought her teddy bear Mister Bubbles along with her.

"Mister Bubbles will keep you safe," she said drowsily as she slid into my bed. Everytime I had one of these dreams she did this. My panic gone I fell back to bed.

"You know you don't have to sleep with me every time I have a dream Hermione," I whispered to her.

"I know. But you're my brother, " she smiled, "I love you and I want you to have good dreams," she whispered slowly back.

She fell right back to sleep. I tucked her in and I looked up to the ceiling. It's been a crazy year and these dreams of this person keep getting more frequent. I had to find him. I had to understand what was going on.

**A/N: I'm a fairly slow writer as I like to write down whatever comes to my head and then revise, revise some more, change entire sections and revise even more. I'm trying out this thing of giving myself about less than three days to post a chapter regardless of length or standard (at least to my standards) quality of writing. Despite doing that I'm sure I'll find a section I don't like post-submission and then re-edit it. I know for example I made a couple of mistakes last chapter that I edited. I hope to keep these coming out regularly but I do work for a living. I hope you guys enjoy this (planned) large story of mine and that you stick with it (if you do stick with it and start to despise it I apologize in advance.) Any suggestions you have I hope to hear them, I don't really answer private messages too often unless there's a subject attached and then by all means I shall answer right away but I prefer not talking to spam messages. I hope you enjoyed this chapter until next time!**


	3. Crawl Space

**Chapter III: Revisiting Our Reputations**

I got up early, way before Hermione or my parents got up. I thought it'd be odd to call them that at first but it surprisingly easy to do it now. I think it helps that I remembered saying to people that I _viewed_ Hermione as a sister and that now she's my actual sister not much has really changed. It also seemed like she's taken a liking to me. Hearing her say as a sister, "I love you Harry," was at first disconcerting, but not as weird as it was at first.

When it came to remembering stuff from back then it was hard. Often it felt like a dream or deja vu. I sometimes forget that I used to be someone else. If it wasn't for Ahri reminding me about the Akashic Library every now and then I could swear my former life would had faded and I would've forgotten everything. And everyone.

Ahri explained it more to me as, "When a person goes back, to be reincarnated, as mortals like to refer; life forgets, it often likes to envelope itself back into the normal cycles. We don't know why, but past a certain threshold we cease to be, reverting to that in the Nexus."

I wondered why that would be undesirable. I had only the faintest of memories of the Nexus, being swallowed up and spat out from a void. Or maybe not a void.

Ahri continuing answered my thoughts, "Imagine knowing everything, everyone, every number, and even grasping the largeness of infinity. Imagine not being able to imagine anything else because you _are_ everything. Those people are what you would describe as Lovecraft fans."

Ahri had demonstrated how to gaze into the Akashic Library's archives and inventories. According to her as I've grown up physically and mentally new abilities and skills started unlocking. One such ability was being able to summon a holographic avatar for Ahri, one that only I'd be able to see. She explained it simply as a cosmetic setup, one to know whenever she was around. I had chosen a sphere of light for her, an orb that was green in color to be her avatar for the moment. I would've made something a little bit more complex but doing so meant doing more work. She had produced the Realm of the Akashic Library or what I simply called the Realm. This Realm was something I once remembered as a virtual reality in my past life something that had only then come out before my… expiration. According to Ahri though what was right in front of me was actually more like Augmented Reality. I didn't know the big difference.

The Realm created a floating screen in front of me it was blank and transparent except for its borders. Ahri gave me a book, well not book per se but another floating screen that she had suggested I scan and read the first part of. It was explaining computer code and Artificial Intelligence creation. It was with that information I was able to create the algorithm for Ahri's orb body. She said the more I read from the Akashic Library the better I would understand to transform the Realm and ultimately everything in it. I had asked her if there were any other books of knowledge in the Library. She said there was, but only books that I would've found in my past life. Asking for specifics she explained I could browse the Library and find books that were, are, and yet to be until my former demise. Which meant I had 19 years worth of information, 19 years of predictive knowledge to glean from. Of inventions to… steal? Lottos to be had and bought. The only thing missing were magical records. It seemed those were locked for now despite having performed magic already.

_I can actually make a lot of money using this. _Now that I thought about it… other than my parents I had no money. I wasn't sure I would even get my Gringott's trust again this time around. I'm sure the… Harry? Of this universe would actually get it. As I was far too young to do anything about this universe's Boy-Who-Lived, as well as being without a concrete plan, of which Ahri was helping me organize in fact: I started to develop bulletins and checklists I deemed important.

With her help I made mental notes in the Realm to figure out money and the other Harry later. As for right now I was starting to get a grasp of the Realm and the Akashic Library. One thing was bothering me however.

_Why did I get this Ahri? _I spoke to her in my head.

_As far as I can tell, you simply deserved it._

_But why? Why couldn't I have been shipped back as Harry Potter? I mean I'm reading all these books on how I got here from the Library but none of it makes sense. You're just saying it's random that by mere chance a thing decided I deserved to go back and in this way? I mean… Am I currently in the past anyway? It's this just… another world?_

… _This is hard to explain without Nexus assimilation. However I shall try my best… within the Nexus; time has no meaning. Due to relativity conjunctures and points of entry there are too numerous possibilities to vocalize without you properly understanding, if however, the concern is if you are Harry Potter then make no mistake you simply have to believe that you are. Your memories are indeed yours as well as another's. The body is simply a body, but in that regard that does not take away from your identity._

_But that's what I'm trying to get at! What is my identity. Who am I?_

_In quantum mechanics particles are only something until observed and perhaps two somethings at once. As for who you are. Time will tell. As of right now, you are Harry Potter come back as an orphan to be adopted the kind Grangers as their son and Hermione's adopted brother. As for everything Library is vast and my knowledge is connected to the Library but the Library is only a limited reference._

I spent the rest of the day with Hermione. When her parents were working we had a nanny who took care of us. However, she mostly worked by herself to tidy up the house. Leaving us to our own devices, I can see why Hermione didn't make good first impressions. She spent most of her time indoors reading books or having me read books for her. If she did play it was mental gymnastics or games that required trivia.

One day she did the unexpected.

"Do you want to play outside?"

"Play? Outside? Now?" I asked incredulously.

"You know I read that exercise is good for you. We can play in the backyard. Just as long as we tell Jenny."

"Okay…" I replied, still a bit gobsmacked.

After we told Jenny that were going outside who also looked a bit surprised but encouraged us nonetheless we went and put on our jumpers.

"I was reading a book…" she started.

"Wait, you did what now," I teased.

She threw a death stare at me and continued as if I didn't say anything, "It was about witches. I thought… maybe you'd like to play with me? You could be the warlock and I'd be a witch!"

My first reaction was caution. Children with magic were inclined to have accidental usage when they were being carefree and imaginative. After a few moments I came to the realization that it didn't really matter to me and I have preferred if it would come up sooner rather than later.

"Sure!" I said enthusiastically. "But I'm going to be a wizard instead of a warlock. Warlocks are old men who have too much time to spend."

She laughed, "Okay! What do you think witches and wizards do?"

"Oh you know, they brew potions. Learn defensive spells, make prophecies, read lots and lots of books for rituals and salves. Go into dungeons… battle dragons… save other witches from lakes… Turn rats into goblets. Anything really. What kind of witch do you want to be?"

She took a second to think, "I want to be a good witch. A smart witch. I wonder if they really made runes. You know there was this one book that said witches used to draw runes that made magic spells and protection charms."

While she was talking I had picked up two wand sized twigs off the ground. "Here you go. It's a wand. We need it to cast magic and write our runes. Here I'll show you." I waved the makeshift wand knowing it wasn't going to work.

She cast her own made up spells at me and every time she did I flinched: I can control my magical abilities, she cannot. We played like this until we decided to duel each other in a makeshift game of spell tag.

"I cast a spell of invisibility!" She said then touched her head. Like an egg had broken on top of her hair she gradually became shimmery and camouflaged. It wasn't a full fledged disillusionment charm but I could see through her.

Using wandless magic I shouted, "Finite!" The charm she had cast on herself disappeared.

"What does that spell do?" She was unaware of what she did and yet happily she looked to me.

"It's a spell that cancels charms and enchantments."

"That's a dumb spell. Wouldn't you be able to cancel anything I cast?" She asked bemused.

Laughing, "Well... no, just charms. You'll need different canceling spells to counter different types of casting magic. And besides if I know where you are and if I'm quick enough I can cast it right at you."

"What's a charm?" She asked tilting her head. _My new sister is adorable._

"Umm… let's see," trying to remember charms class, "it's simple. A charm adds certain properties to an object or creature's being or behaviour, whereas a transfiguring spell will change it into something utterly different."

Hermione seemed to be confused at this point. "Harry what's a tranfiguring spell?"

_Oh no _I thought. I was happy to be talking about magic again but I may have let out too much about _real _magic.

"Oh something I read. It means transforming type of magic."

"Ah okay! I really like this game!"

I smiled. I couldn't wait any longer, to see her face lit up as she got her Hogwarts letter. And to get mine.

"Me too Hermione."

I was sitting with my family during dinner when I started to think about the other orphans at Saint Claire's. I was most concerned about Ezra and Erin. I was wondering how they were doing and whether or not they got adopted. When I left with the Grangers I remember seeing off all my friends and the staff of Saint Claire's.

"We're going to miss you Harry," Erin said behind sniffles. She had cried after finding out I was being adopted but had apologized saying she and her brother, who was also crying, were very happy for me.

"Me- me too!" Ezra I thought took it even harder than she did. With snot and drool dripping from his nose and mouth he had a hard time saying, "T-take this. T-this is so you -r-remember us." In between sobs he gave me his conker nut. It was also the one that I had given to him that was indestructible so that he could feel better about playing with me.

"Thank you…" I hugged him and Erin joined in. We stood there hugging each other for a full minute I was going to miss them very much. I promised them both I was going to see them again some day.

Then it came to saying goodbye to the Sisters.

Anna and Tanya were smiling from ear to ear as they approached. As soon as they got to me though Anna had hoisted me up into her arms and Tanya joined her in a hug.

"You know. If I had a son, I wished he was like you Harry. So strong and smart and cute." Sister Anna spoke with restricted anguish.

"I'll remember you two as my first mommies, I promise."

"Harry are you okay?" Mrs. Granger snapped me from my daydream. She was studying me, watching as I didn't eat my lamb.

"Yes mum, I… was just wondering… how school is going to be," I lied to her.

She smiled, "It's okay darling. At school you get to meet new friends and learn about plenty of subjects so you can choose a career."

"Yes. But what if I want to be a dentist? Couldn't I just stay home and read your books?" I had forgotten that this phase of life meant dealing with the idea of school. I was way too smart to be going back and learning about my basic math. I had other priorities as well.

Mr. Granger laughed softly. "You're too young to have decided to be a dentist yet Harry. Try school, with how smart both you and Hermione are I'm sure you'd love it."

"Yes dad…"

"Chin up Harry. I promise if you don't like it I'll have you over at the practice everyday to show you how to be a dentist."

"Okay." I couldn't help but smile. I never felt this sort of support until my older years. It was different this time around. Alien. Thing was, I still felt like I was young. Maybe it was because I _was_ someone who had craved this when _he_ was a child. Like vicariously looking through this boy that I had become but the thought that perhaps _I am_ the boy just someone who had been imprinted with false memories? Ahri had explained it'd only be a matter of time before I found out for myself.

It so happened that I did go to school. A large school called Garden Suburbs. It was an older school that happened to have some of the best in the nation's education. Fortunately, Hermione and I will be attending at the same time and in the same class.

"Are you excited?" I asked her on our first morning of school.

Her hair bushier than normal she turned around with a smile on her face.

"Of course I am! I heard Garden was one of the most finest schools in the country. Harry you _must _fix your tie! Honestly, I cannot believe you'll be going to school for the first time in your life and decide to represent our family like some hooligan like Reynolds."

She reminded me of the first time I met her in my other world. So confident, so smart, so bossy. Reynolds was an older boy who was going to be attending the same school as us. Unfortunate I thought because the boy was a nefarious bully towards Hermione I had found out one day. I hexed him with a bug swarm when I heard him make fun of Hermione over her teeth. Reynolds and the boys who surrounded him were the reason for Hermione's isolation inside.

When we made to the front doors of the school our parents had shouted from the car good luck and we waved back goodbye.

"I think it's this way." Hermione said as we tried to navigate the school grounds.

"No you have to be wrong- oh wait nevermind you're right."

"Harry I think you need to wear glasses."

"I think you're right Hermione."

Ah so my eyesight got bad around this time I remembered.

School was interesting to say the least, not to say any of the subjects were because I have already gone through all this but because I was capable of seeing Hermione in her younger years. It was like watching a rose bloom in a timelapse.

She was as animated in this class as she was at Hogwarts. Always raising her hand for an answer to a question. And always volunteering to go up to the board.

Unfortunately that was the only interesting thing of school. It wasn't by the second week that I finally understood that if I stayed any longer I'd for sure revert to a pile of jelly.

"How was school today?" Mom asked.

"It was great we only did entry exams, the teachers want to see how much we didn't seem to be too interested. In fact he didn't seem very interested at all today."

"I was Hermione! I just- I was tired."

"Are you not getting enough sleep." Mr. Granger put a hand on my head to see if I was ill.

"No I'm… I'm just bored. Everything the teacher was talking about I already know."

"Oh, right Director Tory did say you were quite advanced. Well from what I heard those exams you did will help place you in proper placement classes, give it a couple more days Harry."

The next week Hermione and I had a surprise visit by the school dean and our teacher Mr. Westerlin. There was another man I didn't recognize standing behind them.

"Harry and Hermione if you don't mind I'd like to introduce you to Professor Luci. Professor Luci is a part of a sister organization down south. He'll help you and work as your own personal teacher here," Mr. Westerlin introduced the man. Professor Luci had on a dark grey suit and homburg hat that hid what looked like silver hair underneath.

"Dr. Lugshire and Mr. Westerlin thank you. Harry, Hermione if you two don't mind I'd like to speak to you in here. We can discuss what exactly we'll be doing together for the year." Professor Luci had a familiar voice; soft and flat he carried each vowel and consonant with precision. He opened the door allowing us in and without so much touching it had closed it behind him. The Professor wasted no time showing us to our seats and sitting on his own chair facing us.

Save for breaths between me and Hermione there was a loud silence that overtook the empty classroom. I looked over to her who had thought the same as I and shot me a quizzical look. We looked back at Professor Luci who only had a small whisper of a smile on his face. He finally sighed and removed his hat revealing an entire head of silver hair pushed back with only a few small silvery wisps falling in front of his eyes. His eyes were the most interesting of his features for they were yellow and black and which were small and calculating hidden behind a beautiful smooth face. He had only one flaw however in what you could've mistaken for a perfect modeled sculpture. A large horizontal scar jagged and messy was strewn from the right side of his nose to his right ear. However I must say it only added mystery to the beautiful aura he encompassed.

I looked back quickly at Hermione who had that same face I recall she had worn with Gilderoy Lochart in our second year.

_Anomaly alert. Magical presence close by. _Ahri said suddenly.

_Ahri are talking about him?_

_Yes, you've unlocked a magicule alert skill. It seems the man in front of you is magically inclined._

A wizard. I opened my Legilimens discreetly. Directing a small mental invasion, I had learned reading from the Library in a book called _Occulmens and Legilis,_ how to probe inside the mind using eye contact. As soon as I reached his eyes however I saw him peering straight back at me with more intensity and with his own invasion. If I was trying to peer into his mind with spies he had brought an entire army and reserves. I recoiled at his mental barrier that was as strong as fifty thousand men with spears and shields. Instead of stabbing back however he simply sat there. Peering at me curious and coyly smiling as if amused by my attempt at Legilimens. I was helpless under his gaze, I had lost a silent battle that left me but more importantly, Hermione, vulnerable to a stranger, that I could only assume now knew then what I was.

"As I was saying, my name is Luci Nexusistausholden. You may call me Professor Luci for reasons that I think are obvious. I languish in many fields namely: sciences and languages of which are my specialties. My aim is to steer you towards many avenues of education. My associates and I come from the Lang Dgur institute we help gifted students such as yourselves reach their potentials, whatever they may be. I hope that you come to trust me in providing you both services that help you reach your goal or goals as they come to you. Normally we invite you to the institute itself however we believe in your case having a close home environment would be best for everyone. If you have any questions, please, do let me know."

"Are we going to a larger class or is Harry and I _the_ class?" Hermione asked.

"You'll be joined with five other students, they also are particularly advanced. I have to be honest with the both of you. We've been meaning to recruit young Mr. Granger here for a while now, ever since he was in Saint Claire's in fact. Director Tory was very right to hold you however Harry for I must say the two of you are very intriguing together. While I've heard of your many expertises Mr. Granger having Ms. Granger along has shown that she's quite the bright one herself."

Hermione blushed, "Actually Harry is the smart one. He's the one who reads to me all the time, he makes all the harder concepts simpler whenever I'm stuck, and he's the one who deserves any sort of credit Professor."

"Hermione…" was the only thing I could muster, I couldn't help but be embarrassed of her praising of me. I knew better than anyone of Hermione's smarts and that it was all truly her. I just happened to cheat with my Sage mode.

"I'm sure Harry is a great teacher Hermione but to listen and to understand are two different concepts. And I think Harry knows like I do that you are very gifted in your own right indeed."

Hermione blushed harder. He continued, "If you could give these letters to your parents, I'll meet them, then perhaps we can finalize this arrangement. As for now you'll take the regular courses."

We took the envelope from his hand.

"Well if that's all." I started.

"Harry may I talk to you for just a moment. It only involves some small details for your parents."

"Go Hermione I'll see you in a bit."

She left reluctantly but left quickly to class.

The facade of school professor faded from Luci's face. Instead a cool and smiling demeanor took over and he reached for his pocket. He took out a wand.

"You know what this is." It wasn't a question. He placed it on the mahogany desk behind him. "I trust that you don't quite remember me yet by your attempts at Legilimens."

"You're the one from my dreams. The Warden."

"Yes. _You_ may call me Warden. It's very nice to meet you Mr. _Granger _in the flesh at last. I hope you know I mean you no harm."

"What are you doing here exactly?" I did not know that and wasn't ready to lay down my guard.

"_Why_, why I'm here to help you. I know you've been meaning to leave and search for the Horcruxes but I would advise against exactly that, at least for now."

"How would you know anything about what I'm planning on doing?" I was weary of the man and so I summoned magic onto my palm in case I needed to stun him with only a simple subvocalization to cast it.

"Worry not, just a guess. In fact I would say I haven't a clue what you're up to although I must say if you happen to be doing something else it would quite the surprise. Is it not your intention to find… the Chosen One?"

"It has been... It's hard to find excuses to leave the house being a boy and all…"

"Exactly! So here I am. Here to help expand your horizons. The organization I work for produces... talents. Not all pan out but some like in your case often do exceed. I've taken upon myself to provide you plenty of resources granted if you follow certain... Protocol."

"Like?" I relaxed my anxiety slightly abietied.

"For example: remaining anonymous. It'd be a problem if you became a celebrity at your age. It would certainly jeopardize chances of being incognito for Hogwarts. A suggestion: you stay Harry Granger. Be free to live the home life and enjoy something that you never got to last time."

"But what about Harry Potter? He's got to go out and live my life. I should stay in luxury when I can help him? Also I've been thinking... if I share the same blood as him then maybe he doesn't have to live with the Dursleys'. I can shelter him instead. In fact I could go to Dumbledore right now and tell him everything. He'll have to believe me. We could do so much now!"

"Stop." Warden took out what looked to be a piece of parchment.

He put it on the desk and nodded at me to examine it.

"This might be somewhat of a shock."

I looked at the parchment, it was a Daily Prophet.

**The Saviour Amidst Massacre**

_James and Lily Potter of Godric's Hallows were found murdered at their cottage on October 31, 1981. According to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement the couple were visited by none other than He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named._

I looked over to Warden wide eyed. "This… I've been trying..." all those years asking for newspapers. This was it, this was the one I've been trying to find!

I read on and the events unfolded the same as before. It described how Lily and James Potter died. That the Potter child had somehow rebounded and survived the killing curse. There was my evidence of another "Harry Potter" in this universe, I quickly thought up what would that make him to me? My brother? A clone? I've never actually seen this report before in my past life. I couldn't help but think at once the numerous possibilities before me. And yet as I continued reading on.

"Hold on," I looked incredulously at Warden," what's this…" Warden looked back at me with what appeared to be sad eyes. I continued reading, "Lily and James Potter… are survived… by their daughter Nova Rosemere Potter…"

**A/N: It has been a tough week for me and definitely not going to be any easier. I feel like I've yet to write a proper chapter because honestly I'm only really trying out this Stephen King method and it boggles me how he's been capable of rolling out books as he had in such quality over the years. I'm honestly also an amateur at writing and have my own demons to face when writing all the time. Constantly torn between insecurities and my own history of writing, not to mention *gasp* real life. This story is years in the making and I plan on finishing it regardless of reception. If anyone is interested there was another story of mine in this "Dark Before" time of life similarly called Along Came a Shadow that I wrote for FF a while ago but because I lost the account information, so I can no longer work on it. This is a second rendition, and I do hope you enjoy or not, whichever works for you.**


	4. Mr Granger

**Chapter IV: The Girl Who Lived**

The Dursley's weren't horrible. In fact I found them somewhat amusing. The family dynamic just happened to revolve around me enough so that when I entered a room three predictable things would happen.

If Petunia was in the room she'd smile and ask how I was. If Dudley was there I'd get that side eye. And if Vernon happened to be there for whatever reason he'd grimace and try a way to leave the room. Again very amusing.

I wondered what it was that made them have such different reactions. I had even asked Petunia one day. It looked like she was going to say something but after a few nervous twitching episodes, mind you she was driving, she completely avoided the question and started talking about Vernon's job.

Odd. I thought.

"A new corporate entity is taking the world by storm today. Silver Tarus Engineerings has posted 80% growth at the fiscal quarter surpassing expectations and signaling more expansion. A representative for STE, Michelle Ambrose, was optimistic future earnings would be even higher next quarter. The reason for the success of STE has been the enormous contribution of their CEO Silver Tarus, a private and mysterious man yet to be identified but nonetheless celebrated. STE has numerous subsidiaries which focuses on electronics and construction. Current contracts include exclusivity rights for NASA and numerous military appointments. Michelle Ambrose, speaking for Silver Tarus, told reporters that the new contracts serves to show the reliability and quality of the company's technologies. There are however many critics about side projects the CEO has been known to employ, namely new companies called Boring and Tesla. Project leaders Elon…"

Uncle Vernon muted out the Tv, as he has numerous times, whenever news of this company came up.

"Boring Company! Boring! What a contrived name for a company! Can you believe this? A software company comes out of nowhere with no business at all suddenly becoming a construction company over night, then has the galls to call a very respected and enduring profession: Boring. It's wrong and they'll be going absolutely down, I tell you!"

My Uncle's bellicose was rather muted today I noted. It only seemed like a few years ago that this company started to make headlines as a pioneer in software manufacturing. Today it's known as that one space company that shoots cars into space. Uncle Vernon would have you believe that such a company who employs names like Boring is the beginning of its own end but I think he's secretly in love with this Silver Tarus. Besides always watching news on it, in private you would see him laugh or sigh saying things under his breath like, "Why didn't I think of that," or, "That's bloody brilliant."

I learned that the extreme hate has been a result of his own work's fear of a take over by this company. While technically based in the United States Tarus Industries had a large celebrity foothold in European countries. Not that I cared all that much about all this. In actuality Vernon took to focusing more on this than on me. All the better because now I had a chance to enjoy my summer.

Not that I was expecting my summer to be any good. I had only been recently promoted from under the staircase to Dud's old room. Petunia had finally felt bad enough for me that she forced Vernon to make the change.

Fine by me as Dudley's birthday soon came by, after a short tantrum about his presents, of which Vernon already being peeved off at recent construction news told off his son. A mistake as Dudley sulked the entire time. Petunia being a doting mother for the bratty kid promised a trip to the zoo after his classes. Grand I thought, now I have to spend time with a bully and his friends. A shame because I was looking forward to the exhibits.

When we reached the zoo fortunately I was allowed to be on my own. Much to the dismay of Petunia. She seemed to have a weirder than normal eye on me. As if she was anticipating I was going to do something.

I was walking through the snake exhibit when I stopped by a boa constrictor.

Dudley and his friends spotted me, shouted, "Hey Potter!"

As they got closer to me one of the other boys pushed me aside and started tapping at the snake. "Reminds you of someone don't int Dud?" The boy asked.

"HA! Yeah, something pathetic," he replied.

"Can you guys leave me alone?"

"Let's go D. Look! There's a cobra."

Dudley looked over me, "Yeah let's go."

I went back to the window pane.

"I hate it when they tap the glass." I looked over at the snake.

"D-did you say that?"

The snake looked up and unwrapped itself from it's coil where it had sat upon a perch. "Yes."

I swear I heard that snake talk.

"Can you understand me?"

It nooded, "Yes." It looked as confused as I did, or well as confused as a snake can look.

Huh I thought. "I must be going crazy."

"You're telling me," the snake said.

"It's just I've never talked to a snake before. I mean- do you, talk to people often?" What am I even asking?

Again the snake talked, "No not really." It had a young voice and it was soft spoken.

"Are you from Brazil? Is it nice there? I'd think it would be better than being here I suppose; lying there day after day, people pressing their ugly faces on you."

He shook his head and pointed at a plaque next to it that read, "Raised in Captivity."

"I'm sorry, that's me too. I never knew my parents either."

Suddenly a boy appeared next to me curious as to what I was doing.

"Hello. Oh my what a beautiful snake." The boy had glasses and a mess of jet black hair as if he had wind style it for him. He was around my age, yet he looked defined, muscular, and tall. He was not like me. Lanky, with clothes too big for my body.

"Hello, " I said somewhat shyly. I looked closer at the boy. He had green, green like mine and a strong jawline. He wore a smile as looked back at me. My face felt hot and I looked down onto his feet. He had a pair of blue and tawny dress shoes that went well with his sleek pants and sports shirt.

"Harry!" A girl with rather large buck teeth and bouncy bushy hair called out. She wore a beautiful white princess cocktail dress white a black sash belt. She had come up to Harry and grabbed him by his arm. "Hello." She said to me, with a ferociously beautiful smile.

"Who's this Harry?" Hermione sounded quite sour, as if I stole a toy from her. Of course, I don't blame her.

"I don't know yet Hermione. My name's Harry, Harry Granger. And yours?"

I had to take a breath to release myself from the picture in front of me. "Uh- my name- my name is Nova. Nova Potter."

"It's nice to meet you Nova. Hermione, I was just marveling at this Boa. Shame, don't you think? Being locked up in there for our amusements?"

"You know zoos do much more than show off wild species. Between conservation and studies exhibits are great ways at learning about wildlife without having to be at a jungle for months at a time."

"No one is declaring zoos to be offensive. Although…," and he looked at me when he said this, "I'm sure that's not what the snake thinks. It was nice meeting you Nova. Sorry to interrupt."

"Can we look at the otters now?" Hermione asked Harry enthusiastically.

I stared at them as they left, feeling a bit sad that I met a somewhat nice pair of kids for only a short time. Story of my life I suppose.

"What an odd couple of kids don't you think?" I asked the snake, remembering the talking snake woke me from my trance. "Do you have a name?"

"I'm not sure. I've kind of been alone all my life. The ones who care for me, they call me Jasper. At least that's what it sounds like. And I don't think I mind that one actually."

"It was nice meeting you Jasper."

Before I knew it a great shove pushed me to the ground and I can hear Dudley call out.

"Mommy! Dad! Look! You won't believe what the snake is doing!"

Pressing his face to pane of the glass, I couldn't help but imagine it disappearing.

Suddenly Dudley fell face forward. The glass had vanished. Splashing into the water I looked on wide eyed. As I got up Jasper moved slithering past the fat boy and unto the ground near my feet.

"Thanks! I think I'll be visiting Brazil."

"Anytime," I replied.

Jasper moved outside where people had started yelling, "Snake!" Shouting had also started to occur inside the exhibit itself as Dudley had found the glass had reappeared. My aunt and uncle yelling and trying to figure out what was going on.

Uncle Vernon looked at me with a red and purple face. Uh oh.

The zoo was able to get Dudley out eventually. But had lost Jasper. Good for him I thought. As for me on the other hand, I was demoted back into my old room below the stairs. Uncle Vernon was sure it was me and for a minute I thought it may have been. But there's no way that could happen… not unless… but no...

Dudley would run up and down the stairs for the next week stomping his way to making sure I had woken up. I appreciated his impression being an alarm clock. I did not appreciate the eyeballs I had gotten from the rest of the family however.

Ever since then I was delegated to what seemed like 24 hour chore duty. It became a daily, "Nova do this," or, "Nova here's a list of what to do."

One day while I was asked to sort the post I had found a letter written for me. Dudley had snatched it from me thinking I had stolen it.

"Who would right to you," Uncle Vernon had said. As soon as he saw the letter however his face had paled and turned grim. He ripped the letter in half and placed it into the fireplace. Odd. I thought.

But something strange had been starting to occur on Privet Drive. A rather large population of owls had started welling up around the neighbourhood. And the letters for me had grown. Each one however intercepted by my Uncle. My Aunt who used to be relatively kind to me had started to throw eye daggers at me, like a long lost memory had occurred to her.

"The letters are spam. You don't have to worry about them." She would say to dismiss me.

The letters and owls had become such a problem that Vernon had started to close all windows within the house and drilled planks in any open areas a letter can get in.

"Sundays. I love Sundays. You know why I love Sundays?" Vernon asked.

"Cause we don't get posts on Sundays?"

"Right you are, Nova. No posts on Sundays, ha!"

A tremor alerted us to the chimney. When suddenly a piece of parchment hit my Uncle in the face. Another letter. And then another. And more, until hundreds of letters started to fill the room. A whirlwind pushing up each piece of parchment into the air for me to grab.

"WHAT IS GOING ON!" Vernon shouted. I grabbed one of the letters from the air and started to my room. "GIVE ME THAT LETTER!"

As I ran to unlock the stairway door Vernon had managed to grab me by my waist.

"WE'RE GOING FAR AWAY. WHERE THEY CAN'T FIND US!"

"You know if you didn't get hit so much you wouldn't be bleeding." Warden stood over me, a hand stretched out.

"I also would not be bleeding if you didn't hit so damn hard." I took his hand and he lifted me up.

My nose was bleeding yet again. I could've ducked and missed his staff, which would've left him open to a counter attack. There was something about his speed that no matter what I did I couldn't counter.

"Remember keep your balance; retreat if you have to and fight if you have no choice. Here," he gave me a towel for my nose.

The blood kept flowing so I used wandless magic to fix it. I concentrated and accumulated energy towards my nose. I felt the familiar itch as it moved the muscle and cartilage into position.

Today was just another session of getting my butt whooped by my Professor before the end of class. We trained in martial arts and self defence at the Opetis Grounds, a section of the Lang Dgur institute. According to Warden my magic is incapable of being tracked here.

"We can take a minute, come on." We went over to sit down at the benches. Opetis Grounds was a large stadium sized room outfitted with all sorts of equipment and tracks. You could have an Olympics down here I thought. The Grounds itself was concealed by magic, despite that the Lang Dgur was large enough anyway to have it's own public grounds for muggles called Regal Track.

As I was recovering from my beating Warden decided to make light conversation. "How's Hermione?"

I looked over quizzically, "She's fine. Why?"

"You only have a couple months. Pretty soon you'll be leaving here."

"Fine I'll play your game," I said rather angrily.

"I'm just asking how everything's going Harry," Warden smiled as he drank from his water bottle.

I sighed I didn't mean to be aggressive with him, "I'm sorry, the end of the year is… making me anxious. Hermione has been asking what we've been doing lately. I don't like lying. Not to her. Luckily she's been busy with her own studies, thank you by the way."

"No problem. She's smart, your Hermione. You know I had to assign her five different papers on the applications of electromagnetism for that satellite. I'm not even sure if I would have finished two myself yet the next day she got it done. I had to get Professor Moody to make a ridiculous set of lessons for her. She's unnatural."

"Sorry…"

"So. Have you decided what you want to do?"

"What? You mean the Plan? That's two months off at least, no need to worry about it."

"Harry..." Warden sounded exasperated.

"What am I supposed to do? Say hi? How do you even approach... myself? I have a hard enough time trying to figure out what to do about Voldemort now I'm being asked how to meet her in person."

"Look you just need to make a decision. By your outburst you seem to want to meet her, so let's keep that in mind. As for old Voldy we've discussed that enough times. We can't do anything until we get to Hogwarts. We can corner him there as we gather all the Horcruxes and at the final moment when Nova meets him at the Mirror of Erised we take him out."

"That's the thing though. We're just going to let everything occur like before? We can gather the locket the quickest at Sirius's house, the diadem when I get to Hogwarts, but everything else is still extremely hard to get."

"I think we can manage. Dumbledore found the ring, as you say at that tattered house in the gold box, that I can acquire. I will admit the Goblet and the Diary will be hardest to find considering it's in possession of two death eaters one of which is in Azkaban. Nagini wasn't created until your fourth year. We can prevent that one."

"You're forgetting the most important one."

Warden's face turned somber. "And Nova…"

"How do we save her?" I asked agitated. I lived last time because Voldemort killed me and only because I had sacrificed myself, and only because Voldemort had my blood within him. Having all that recreated… it would require four years of hardship for this poor Nova Potter. Perhaps…

"The only reason I haven't gone into Azkaban to save Sirius is because of this, not being able to figure this out is outrageous!"

"He'll be fine Harry. He's through Azkaban before."

"That's comforting." I said sarcastically.

"Take whatever comfort you can Harry, despite having a head start on Voldemort... war seems inevitable. We just have to save as many as we can."

My days had no particular routine. I would wake up at 9. Have breakfast with my family and leave with Hermione to school. At school Hermione and I started in the same class together in homeroom. Getting all our assignments turned in was the first task of the day. Five other students were with us. Newton, Renee, Samuel, Archie, and Katrina. They were quiet students save for Katrina and Archie but all very smart. Some more so than others.

Classes were interesting themselves. The school grounds were huge. They were large enough to house hundreds of students. However, we were a specialist school serving only several dozen students. The Professors had many assistant teachers that helped with axillary lessons. I had Warden contact Professor Lupin. He was easy enough to find and had taken to the job well, which paid him salaried and in abundance. Hermione and I would always try to find time to visit him and like before he was good at doing his job.

It was odd for me to see him work as a muggle professor but finding out he was equally proficient at English was good enough for me. I remembered seeing him start class in ragged suits, but now he was finely dressed and well kept. Except of course during the moon's full phase. In fact I was very worried when he got interviewed because the possibility that he'd refuse to work was high as he was already hesitant over the fact that he was sought after anyway. Warden had made the effort to let Lupin know that he'd only be teaching English on certain days of the month. The excuse being we would be taking every full moon to observe celestial bodies as part of an astronomy class, even on rainy days. A very real class in Lang Dgur but an activity very much made up on the spot.

He was joyous at the opportunity.

Classes were different from anything I had experienced. I say classes but really they were periods for me to walk around with Warden, or rather Professor Luci. He knew that anything I needed to know would be stored in the Akashic Library, and that he'd rather we would practice different types of knowledge and skills.

"Money making. I'll be teaching you how to build a corporate empire. In between you'll learn martial arts before the end of class. Martial weapons training, magical theories, and we'll start unlocking some of your high tier skills for your Library."

"How about the others?"

"Hermione and the others will be similarly taking private classes. But there are group lessons you'll have to participate in. I suggest you participate in. Our lessons will be sparse but I promise to be in depth. Besides most of the stuff will have you work from home. Except for the physical training of course."

"While I have no problem with all this wouldn't my parents think it'd be weird that their son is getting athletic training. I mean don't muscles usually show up from doing that?"

"Oh it's explained in the syllabus all children are given martial training, you'll be getting advanced courses, but Hermione will be getting it too. Most parents who want military trained kids actually send their children here. Those kids work offsite of course, but those cadets do in fact have better chances of being officers in the future."

Homework and assignments were different as well. Gone were the days that I was assigned to do copy and paste essays and papers. Instead I was given more practical forms of work. Professor Luci specialized in engineering sciences. He was tasked outside of the school program to work on a secret project that was described somewhat similar to CERN, or perhaps was CERN. If that was the case he wanted me to help him provide mechanical research into building accelerating magnets that tracked atoms to the minute details.

None of this was had me paid I remarked. Of which he replied, "Well of course not. There is no way they'll take research papers from a six year old boy. This is all investment anyway. You provide me the paper and I'll have CERN made into reality. Hell we'll get LIGOs and all those others large lettered studies started with the idea we can have our foot in the door."

"What am I going to do for money then?"

"I've got that covered. I've set up an account in your name. It's actually not uncommon. Everyone of these students in Lang Dgur are slated to have professions in certain fields. Your accomplishments are recorded and indeed helped as part of the criteria for financial gains. You can't be burdened with finances of course being as young as you are, but we hold them in trust funds. In your case I've made a private account under a different name. It'll be your alias if you so choose."

"What's the name?"

"Silver Tarus."

And so I was. Silver Tarus technologies were by the time I was 9 had become renowned for its quality. At first I started with simple software programs. It then gained traction with numerous gaming companies and internet startups. I had also worked on military technologies. I made sure to only do work on time specific tech for the military, if it wasn't created that year I would avoid "inventing" it. American and European countries were scrambling to see what I had to unfold at the Silver Conferences I would have every six months. STE or Silver Tarus Engineering corps. Bad become a brand name. The Akashic Library helped tremendously for all of these, however, and I don't know if it was the kid in me, but I had found emerging leaders in tech at Africa, namely these Musk boys who had fantastic ideas about the future. I let them take capital and I provided logistics and severely restricted startup technologies that were yet to be invented for at least the next decade like laptops and powerful servers to launch their own startups. I had learned how to invest in stocks working my way to own near majorities in companies like Google and Apple. Among others.

In my spare time I would work on Ahri. Learning more and more about from the Library I learned she can project using my magic. Her outer appearance had also changed. So far it would not pass the uncanny valley test, but I was getting there as I was working on my artistic abilities. She had a face, hair, and eyes. Her eyebrows were cosmetic and didn't move. She had a simple nose if I could call it that. But she was passable as a starting model. My aim was to make her into a true AI. If I was to do that for her, however, I would need to continue to work her appearance some more. Her own intelligence and speaking patterns became more human like the more I talked to her. She explained she learned from an origin program when she was created along with the Library. Only experience would increase her humanity. However, she still asked plenty of questions that came to morality. In those cases I would help her by explaining how I would make tough decisions.

With Ahri I never felt lonely. But I tried my hardest to only talk with her when I was truly alone. And I never projected her in fear any one of my family members walked in the door. Despite this Hermione kept me company everyday, or as many days she can see me. She was thriving in the vast libraries of Lang Dgur. And with the abundance of school teachers she was challenged everyday. While schooling had her busy I couldn't help but worry she may become stressed.

"You're the smartest person I know, Harry. One of these days I'll surpass you. And I'll have you acknowledge me."

"But I know you're smart Hermione."

She shook her head. "No. There's going to be a day when you get stuck I'll be there with the answer. When that day comes I'll know I've made it."

We had taken 23 June off for a family vacation but had yet to decide where to go. It was perfect for me however, I immediately fought for the zoo.

"The zoo? Are you sure? Hermione said the planetarium was having a new projector out, why the zoo?" Mr. Granger asked.

"Animals are fun. Hermione, I want see some otters."

Her eyes lit up at that. "DAD LET'S GO TO THE ZOO!"

The day we left had my heart beating quicker than normal. This was the day. All my planning. The scheming was going to begin. I've yet to truly understand what I was going to feel, but Warden had assured me that anything that was to happen was at least measured once before. Still the thought of meeting myself gave me goosebumps. I was well versed in time theories. The one where I may be an anti-matter Nova Potter duplication was frightening. If that was the case simply being in each other's company can spell doom for the Universe as we exploded into annihilation. Or perhaps I would simply cease to exist as soon as I saw her. Or perhaps she ceased to be.

When we got there I had spent time with the Grangers as far as the insectarium. Close by was the snake exhibit. And it was nearly time now.

"Mom, Dad I'm going to the snake area. Can I meet you back over here?"

My dad simply engrossed in the leaf cutter ants nodded, "Okay but just for a minute and take Hermione with you please. Honey look at that, can you imagine having this at the house?"

Taking Hermione by my side all you could here is mom go, "Wendall Wilkins Granger I absolutely forbid you-"

"Dad's going to be getting a nagging session now." Hermione said offhand.

When I reached where the snakes were Hermione excused herself to the loo. I looked over and saw her.

I don't know what took over me, but my heart started to thump a rather irregular beat. My hands started to shake. I was going to explode, I thought. But I fixed my gaze on her. I looked down at my hands. Still here.

There she was, undoubtedly. Is this narcissism? I had thought, I couldn't stop thinking about how my female counterpart to be rather beautiful. Granted a mess, but beautiful nonetheless. Green eyes, like my mom and I. Messy jet black hair, like me. And her scar… visible from even here.

I felt compelled to meet her. My feet moving on their own inched me closer to her. Closer and closer until I heard her. She was talking. A sweet voice, girly. That's how I would sound as a girl? She had a pale complexion, her hair was unkempt and fell to her back, and I noticed she crossed her arms as if guarded.

Eventually I was close enough to be by her side. I faced the glass, pretending to be interested in the snake. She looked at me, I couldn't help but say something.

"Hello. Oh my what a beautiful snake." She looked at me side eyed, she had scanned me from top to bottom. I felt her gaze and I couldn't help but feel awkward.

"Hello," she said somewhat shyly. She continued to look at me but more blatantly. I tried my hardest to give a warm impression but I couldn't make out her thoughts as she continued to eye me.

"Harry!" Hermione had come running out of the loo run right toward my arm. She gave a glance towards Nova. "Hello." She said to her, giving Nova a smile.

"Who's this Harry?" Hermione sounded jealous.

"I don't know yet Hermione. My name's Harry, Harry Granger. And yours?"

There was a momentary pause as she inhaled and exhaled, "Uh- my name- my name is Nova. Nova Potter." I couldn't help but think that perhaps there was a glitch in her matrix.

"It's nice to meet you Nova. Hermione, I was just marveling at this Boa. Shame, don't you think? Being locked up in there for our amusements?"

"You know zoos do much more than show off wild species. Between conservation and studies exhibits are great ways at learning about wildlife without having to be at a jungle for months at a time."

"No one is declaring zoos to be offensive. Although…," and not being able to help knowing what I knew looked over at Nova and said, "I'm sure that's not what the snake thinks. It was nice meeting you Nova. Sorry to interrupt."

"Can we look at the otters now?" Hermione asked me enthusiastically.

"Yes. Let's go find mom and dad first."

As I started walking away from the snake exhibit a pang of guilt hit me. I looked back.

"Do you think she was pretty? That girl in there?" Hermione asked.

"What? No! I- I liked the snake that's all."

Rolling her eyes she started walking back to the insectorium.

My face flushed I bared my teeth. The hell was this feeling? And what the hell is up with Hermione?

We were at the entrance of the insectorium when we heard screaming. Quickly Mr. and Mrs. Granger came out. "Harry! Hermione! Thank god, what's going on?"

We shrugged and looked toward the screaming. Our parents drew us close to them. "Snake!" We heard visitors call out. "Snake is loose!"

There we saw the same boa slithering along the pavement before he had found a drain ditch to fall into.

"That's the same boa isn't it Harry?" Hermione asked.

"I'm pretty sure it was. You think he's okay?"

Unfortunately we never got to the otters much to the dismay of Hermione. They had closed off the zoo in light of the missing snake. I was still perplexed. A vortex of feelings, anxieties, and excitement were rolling in the deeper parts of me. Ahri had even started to grow tired of my inner struggle.

"I'm not exactly sure what you're feeling HArry but whatever it is can you stop it?" She had asked me.

"It doesn't work that way Ahri. Humans work through their emotions. I'd like to think I'm better than most when it comes to that but I'm sure what I'm feeling to be honest."

"Regardless if you toss and turn anymore and I'll be throwing a fit."

"Yeah we're going to have to fix your speech algorithm a bit."

"Fair enough."

"Harry! Hermione! In the family room please!" Mr. Granger called out.

I quickly got to my feet.

"What's going on dad?" I quickly scanned the room. Dad and mom were sitting down with a person wearing robes. They came quicker than I thought. If… this is the person I think it is.

"Harry, Hermione. My name is Alton Amos. I work at Hogwarts as a faculty member."

"Hogwarts?" Hermione's eyes looked wide. "Mom, dad what does he mean?"

"We're not sure sweety."

"I can explain some more. But first…" He took out two letters. One for Hermione and another for me.

We opened the letters together. On the first page was written;

HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY

Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock,

Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

Dear Mr. Granger,

We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.

Yours sincerely,

Minerva McGonagall

Deputy Headmistress

On the second page was equipment and uniforms.

At last I thought, I was going back home.

**A/N: I plan on writing some more tomorrow. As for right now here's another chapter. I'll fix any glaring problems in the writing later I just wanted to get this thing submitted right away.**


	5. In Conclusion!

**Chapter V: The Wand Chooses**

~Hermione~

"So what? They do magic like spells and enchantments?" Dad sounded rather intrigued.

"Can you show us?" Mom goaded the supposed wizard, Amos.

Mr. Amos took out a stick and pointed at our chimney, "Yes I could do a couple, Inflamarei." A spark flew out of the end of the stick and lit the chimney aflame.

"That's one spell. There are many others that your children can learn. Harry, Hermione have any of you felt like something occurred without you knowing? Things vanishing, things appearing, things happening without any clue how?"

"Yes," I said immediately. "There was this one time, I was reading a book and I had misplaced it. I got so frustrated… I then saw it right next to me. Only thing was I had searched for it right on that table. I thought maybe… maybe I looked passed it but I was so certain that it wasn't there before."

"There's a spell like that. _Accio." _He waved his stick at a glass ornament sitting on our table. It had hovered over to him. My mom and father were agape. No doubt now that magic was real.

"Now that I think about it, Wendall, do you remember when Hermione was a kid and she used to get into those weird situations with the Reynold boy?"

"What do you mean?" He asked.

"You remember, one day Reynolds and his parents started coming down on us for him being on the roof. I thought at first that maybe Reynolds was lying, but… Hermione… you didn't?" Mom looked at me pleadingly.

"Honestly, mom I may have." I didn't have any idea if it was me, but if it was then I definitely didn't feel bad. Reynolds was a jerk and deserved it.

Dad shook his head in disbelief, "This actually explains a lot of the weird things that happened when you two were little. By any chance does magic affect knowledge retention?"

Mr. Amos amused by the realizations of the Grangers shrugged, "Possibly, but nothing that would be permanent. There are ways to be certainly… dimmer for lack of a better word."

I was mesmerized by what was happening. A sudden realization hit me. _I'm magic._

"Harry and I… we could do this?" I said a rising excitement in my voice. I looked over to Harry.

I was expecting Harry to be as happy as I was but as our eyes met, I could only wonder if he perhaps wasn't as surprised about this as I was. He only had a slight smile. It was the one that he wore when I would be stumped over a subject. A question that he knew in extraordinary detail and was ready to explain to me what I glossed over.

He broke our gaze, a shame as he had beautiful eyes. Eyes I would oftentimes be lost in whilst during our study sessions for example.

The wizard Mr. Amos explained," Yes, you and Harry have magic inside you. It's imperative, however, that we get it under control. Many a wizard and witch with uncontrollable magic become liabilities and a danger to themselves and to others."

"What do you mean?" Dad asked.

"It hasn't happened in Britain for a very long time now. Wizards and witches don't necessarily have the best reputations... When children repress their magical abilities they become… Obscurials. It is most important that does occur."

"Why is that?" Mom asked.

"They're tall destructive parasites that destroy cities. Very hard to control once a parasite takes hold of your child. And if it becomes too late to calm it… well it becomes very hard for the Aurors. It's never a good day to have to bring down a Obscurial."

I shivered. I can get a parasite from not using magic?

"Typically, you as parents still have rights to not care and continue on as you are but we highly advise against of course."

"Oh. Well we'll leave that to the kids of course. Harry, Hermione. What do you think? Do you want to go to-" Mom looked over to Mr. Amos.

"Hogwarts." Mr. Amos helped.

"-to Hogwarts?" Mom asked.

It was Harry who went forward. He took out his hand and palm upwards he snapped his fingers. A flame hovered over Harry's fingers. Everyone looked at him but no one more wide eyed than Mr. Amos himself.

Harry looked over to Hermione.

"I didn't know how to tell anybody. I was scared. But now that I know who I am… I want to go."

"If Harry's going, I'm going too!" I quickly interjected.

Mom and Dad looked at us, then at each other. I loved it when they were like this. They were talking with their eyes, something I loved to tell Harry.

"Okay. What's the first thing we have to do Mr. Amos?" Dad asked.

Mr. Amos who was still scanning Harry looked over to my Dad, "Oh umm… right. You'll be assigned a guide. He's someone you know, which will help things I think. I have a letter-" he took a letter out from his robes, "-he'll meet you at this address it's called the Leaky Cauldron."

Dad took the letter. He thanked Amos who then proceeded to explain he was heading out to meet another family.

"And don't worry about finding him. He'll find you. Tom the barkeep over there will greet you and help you out."

With that he left.

With the wizard Amos gone my Dad and Mom descended on us. Dad unto me and Mom unto Harry. Picking us up they started to kiss our necks and faces.

"Dad! Stop!" I managed to get out in between laughs.

They settled down only when I accidentally elbowed my dad in the face, but all four of us were still laughing.

"I'm sorry Dad."

"Better him than me," Mom interjected.

"Harry do you see, do you see why I needed another man here?" Dad pleaded to Harry.

"So that if Hermione knocks you out, I'll be in charge?"

"Honey what's the return policy on Harry again?"

"Too late Dad you had a one year free trial and that's way expired." I quipped.

"Fine how about a warranty then, it's obvious he's defective." He grabbed Harry and started to tickle him.

"All right, let's not get you another black eye Darling." Dad put Harry down.

"Fair enough," was all he said. "Honestly though, we're very proud of you. We want you to feel special about this new… identity of yours."

"Thanks Dad," they've taken and accepted our magic quite well. It's been only a few minutes but learning about magic had gotten me so excited. But then… I remembered Harry.

I stopped and turned to him. "I'm sorry Harry."

He stopped and looked back at me. I sighed internally at my brother, he's got such lovely eyes. And face, and hair.

"What for Hermione?" He asked.

"I didn't know you were scared."

He looked at me disconcertedly. "It's okay, it's not your fault. I should have trusted all of you more. I just didn't want to frighten anyone."

I hugged him. I hugged him really hard. For a minute he stayed rigid. But then wrapped his arms around me. A warm sensation filling me inside. Slowly Mom and Dad came to embrace us too.

I was so worried. And so happy. That the last orphanage we planned to go to had you, Harry.

We got out of our car and came to the entrance of a pub. The Leaky Cauldron sign hanging above it.

Inside was rather quiet. There was a bar and several parlour rooms. Tom the man we were told to find was the bartender.

"You can take a table if you wish. Your… friend will be here soon."

We decided to get some food. "Get us some fish and chips, some drinks too," Dad ordered.

Tom got us the food and we thanked him.

We waited for a while, we came early in anyway, but we had a good family lunch before a familiar voice was heard.

"Grangers!" We turned to look at the voice and indeed it was Professor Lupin.

"Professor what are you doing here?" Harry asked.

"It seems Amos wanted to keep it a surprise. I'm your guide for today," he was very happy to see us.

"You? But don't you work for Lang?"

"I still do. I'm employed by Hogwarts during this time. I help Muggle-borns to be introduced into our society. I wouldn't have guessed that you two would be magical though. But I'm glad for it, congratulations! I know you'll do well at Hogwarts."

Professor Lupin took us to the rear of the pub where behind a door we faced a brick wall.

"Here is the entrance to Diagon Alley. It's the place we'll be getting all your supplies." Lupin said.

"But it's a wall." I said confused.

Harry looked up at Lupin.

"It's not just a wall is it?" He said.

Lupin smiled and nodded. "Very good Mr. Granger. You're very right of course." He took out a stick one like Amos had. "This is a called a wand. It helps us channel our magic. You'll be getting one very soon."

He tapped his wand around the wall where a few bricks were missing. He hit four of the bricks before standing back. There was a sound of stone moving and I finally saw what was happening. The bricks started to individually move around each other like a puzzle outwards. A slit of light appeared in the middle and then opened to the sky.

A scene that I can only describe as fantastical was before me. Men and women in robes, capes, and pointed hats littered an alleyway where shops had taken residency on the sides. The sound of clatter and voices of people filled the air.

"Welcome, to Diagon Alley." Lupin remarked.

I got out the parchment that had our school supplies. There's so many things we have to buy, a thought occurred to me. My Dad had apparently gotten the same question.

"Do you guys take cheques?"

An amused smile came from Lupin. "No, unfortunately. Our first stop is to the bank. The exchange fee for muggles is extraordinarily low."

While Lupin led the way Harry and I followed relatively close to our parents. I couldn't stop being amazed at the picture in front of me. "Harry, do you remember when we used to play as wizards and witches?" I asked.

"Yes Hermione." Harry replied. He too was looking around furiously over every store a huge smile on his face. One that I've seen only once before, that day mom and dad said they'd finally adopted him.

"We're not playing that anymore. _We are it."_

He smiled slyly. A beautiful smile I thought.

We had gotten into Gringotts and Dad exchanged some money.

Dad and Mom were absolutely enchanted with everything. However when it came to dealing with the bankers my dad couldn't help but ask about them.

"Those Goblins, you called them? Are they angry or…?" Dad asked Lupin, trailing off slightly.

"You never really know… but do try not to find out." Lupin managed to answer. My dad didn't need to be told twice.

"So, where should we start?" Mom asked. It looked as if she was ready to explore everything herself. With or without us.

"Over here. Ollivanders. There's no better wand shop in the entire country."

A strapline over head read in peeling gold letters, "Makers of fine wands since 382 B.C." A display window under it consisted of a solitary wand on a purple cushion. We opened the door and a bell rang. Inside the shop was narrow and shabby.

The shop was so tiny that only a single, spindly chair fit at the corner, as the rest of the shop was littered with thousands of narrow boxes piled up to the ceiling. The whole place had a dusty odor to it. I loved the smell. Like old tomes.

I admired the shop and my curiosity continued to climb as I soaked in the etchings on the boxes. They were all labeled with metal that was engraved with numbers. Some were brass, others what looked like silver, and then gold.

"New faces in the shop. It's always good to see new faces. Oh and of course an old one. Greetings Remus."

"Mr. Ollivander these are the Grangers. This is Harry and Hermione."

We both greeted him. Lupin explained to our parents that choosing a wand was going to be time consuming. And that in time he and our parents could find some of the other equipment we had to get.

"Good luck sweetie." Mom said as she kissed me on the cheek, she was very excited to go back exploring.

"I think we should start with Ms. Granger. You seem very bright, I wonder: are you an avid reader?"

"Yes." I replied.

He nodded his head then started mumbling under his breath. "One second."

He took out a box that had the numbers 1356 on it. He took off the top and presented it to Hermione. "Vine wood, and dragonheart string. 10 and ¾ inches."

Ollivander looked at me. I took the wand and a warm sensation filled my hand and then the rest of my body.

"And on the first try!" Ollivander was noticeably happy. "And now to you Mr. Granger. Come into the light and don't be shy."

I looked at Harry. He seemed hesitant at first but approached. I watched intrigued which wand Harry would get.

"You seem to be a reader too. Although I must say you seem… curious," he looked over at me then back at Harry. "You two don't seem to be related?"

"I'm adopted…" Harry said.

Ollivander nodded. "You remind me of a student who had come here once. A good man named James Potter, funnily enough his wife Lily Potter she had eyes just like yours. It's remarkable. Except for the black hair you'd be the spitting image of them both. I'm sorry, I remember every single wand I've ever sold Mr. Granger. Every. Single. One. And all of the people who bought them. And I must say…" He trailed off. "Well past is in the past."

I was intrigued. "Who were the Potters?"

"Oh. we don't typically talk about it, it's a story that ends in tragedy I'm afraid."

I pushed anyway, "Why not?"

Ollivander looked at me and then back at Harry, who had been looking down. "Are you okay Harry?"

"It's nothing," he said quickly, snapping his head back up to meet my eyes. "Can we get my wand?"

Ollivander nodded slowly, "Yes, of course."

Harry was harder, much harder to find a wand for. Six times as he held a wand something would either break or do something catastrophic to the shop.

"No. No. Definitely not. Repairo." Ollivander seemed to be in his thoughts for a short minute, pondering which wand to get it seemed, but then exclaimed, "I got it!"

The older man scurried into the back room. Rufflings and clattering occurred behind the scenes. Until eventually he came out with a plain unlabeled black box.

"This one was recently donated to me. He didn't tell me who crafted it, didn't tell me where he got it, and didn't provide me a name. I analyzed the wand but have yet to get to the core. It's… made of as far I know the core is stable. It is a hair. Of which I do not know. Now perhaps…" he held it out for Harry.

Harry looked at the wand. He eyed it with a sort of detached and sad... longing? He grabbed it. The entirety of the shop loomed dark. The single lamp flickered. A shadow overtook the window and I was slightly alarmed. As suddenly as the feeling of dread came, it left.

"Curious. Very curious."

"What's curious sir?" Harry asked.

"Your wand. We have a saying in wandlore. Wand of elder, never prosper. Be careful Mr. Granger. Surely I'm sure the very wand you hold is quite powerful. Even dare I say has great power and terrible power, but hopefully you may change its attitude."

Lupin and our parents came back and we paid for our wands. 7 Galleons each. I was ecstatic with my wand, now I can do magic! Harry on the other hand seemed rather down on himself. He looked at the one as if afraid of it.

"It's scary, we can do things that we're not sure of yet," Harry, my brother who was often fearless and brave when exploring new knowledge was muted and suppressed by caution.

"What did you do with my brother?" I teased but even then he ignored me. Continuing to look ill at his wand. "Surely it's not that bad."

He nodded. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to worry you Hermione." He stopped placed his hand behind my head and pushed towards his. He headbutted me lightlly and then looked over to me. I was smiling and decided to give him a hug which he returned.

The professor and our parents had managed to get nearly all of our supplies. We had but one more store to go to and it was the one I was most interested in.

"We just need to get our books." For whatever reason my mouth was dry and suddenly I was thirsty. But my mind went back to the books. Books... Books...

And goodness there were a lot of them. I could spin and fall into a pile of books for all I care. I was in heaven. And all of these were based on magic. Books on spells, books of magical creatures, books for potions, there were so many books I couldn't help but start reading any and every book I could get my hands on. I scanned each one, words I've never seen or heard before, and before I knew it I looked up. I saw Harry with an eyebrow up in a questioning manner.

"But… but... The books…"

"Time to go Hermione. Mom and dad got our books.

"But… more…"

Harry sighed.

A/N: I'll be trying new perspective change formats. Do let me know if it gets easier or harder to read and keep up with. I definitely aim to make it easier. I'm starting to enjoy this writing experience and I anxiously hope you like it too. This is a romance work but I do aim to explore action in it as well as a bit of mystery. The next chapter will hopefully be out tomorrow, or well today seeing how I wrote and am submitting this at midnight. Do leave reviews they do keep me going and I'd like to know if there's any errors too. I re-read the prior chapters and found quite a bit of mistakes, which I plan to fix at a later time, as for now I'm still trying to churn these out. Until the next chapter ta!


	6. There are No More White Knights

**A/N: Truly forgive me, for I have sinned. I don't plan on making a short title. So any opinions on my storytelling I feel is too premature and I'd rather see those at the end. However words of encouragement for a newbie and pointers are much welcome.**

**Chapter VI: Black Hole Sun**

~Harry~

I was anxiously pacing back and forth in my room. My parents and Hermione had left some time ago to get take-out dinner. I stayed using the excuse to study my new books. Hermione only left because she was forced, she had stayed home these past few days doing nothing but reading. It was wonderful because I needed to be alone.

"Ahri I need you to contact Warden. I need him here now."

"As you wish." She said.

I had spent time with Ahri these past years giving her upgrades to her code. For her appearance I had given her wavy red hair, fixed the eyebrow problem, and gave her more detail as well as a moving body. I may have, ahem, given her body touch ups. Awkward as it was, I had built a beautiful woman; lush cleavage, curves, and legs that ran for miles, for a reason of course. As her projection looked the best it has ever been before and her language skills had become much more human-like I took it upon myself to find her a use. In fact, her body and voice had become so convincing, and her *ahem* personality so well received in privately funded studies that I had started to give her tasks and duties as my companies' representative. I gave her the alias of Ms. Ambrose. Of course anytime she talked to someone it had to be through video or phone conferencing.

The decision had become a hit. She not only had been perfect to run the numbers for STE Industries, she had become a sensationally celebrated model for the company (known as the world's unofficial hottest person for financial sector news, three years running.)

A moment and one _crack _later and Warden appeared in front of me smiling. "Harry! Oh... did something happen?"

I was eleven but I was strong, strong enough to push Warden to the wall. "How the hell did this happen?" I whispered menacingly to him.

Confused, Warden asked, "Did what happen?"

"This." I took out my new wand and showed it to him. "Why do I have I have this?" I repeated.

His smile faded, his eyebrows went up, "Oh… right, I found it," he answered lamely.

"Come again?" I asked dumbfounded.

"If you don't mind." He looked to my hand, I reluctantly released him. "Now don't get your knickers in a knot. I went back to Saint Claire's, as you know we like to recruit people for Lang, it's part of the outreach programs. Director Tory and I were talking and conversation shifted to you."

"And?"

"Well she asked how you were and I asked some questions myself; she said you were found in a basket?"

"Yeah, I knew that already. Everybody knew that," I started wonder where he was getting at.

"Right… but did they tell you what they found _with_ you?"

I hesitated, after a quick pause he continued, "I figured you wouldn't have. They thought it was strange. They found with you two letters, a stick, a ring, and a cloak."

"Wait you mean?" I started a realization.

"You seem to have been the first master of death. Well... again." Warden confirmed.

"Where are they? What letters?" I asked immediately.

"Oh they're with me. I had to use the imperious curse to get them, unfortunately. The wand I had to give to Ollivander. I figured the less you knew the better. As for everything else." He took out of his long coat two parcels and gave them to me.

A strange and alien feeling burned into my hand, a sensation that shocked me and made me drop the parcels.

"Anomalies detected, Hades Program initiated. _By the Primodrials, forefathers, becoming and rot obsessed. Blessed thee are we._" Ahri said. Quite ominously I must add.

"Ahri what the hell was that?" I exclaimed.

In the same tone she continued, "Artifacts procured. Gateway assimilation complete. Automatic input: Deathly Hallows."

A whirlwind of power surged through my room. A spark of blue light appeared, hovering in the middle and started to get brighter. With a flash and a _bang_ the light grew in size. I shielded my eyes from the light. And when I felt the light dissipate I looked back. Where the light had been a huge black hole appeared. The very corners were burning white light and smoke like white phosphorus. What looked like stars filled the hole and irradiated a sense of massivity.

"What. The. Fuck. Is. That?" I asked to no one in particular.

Warden stepped up to the portal with caution.

"It's a portal."

"Merlin's balls, yes, a portal but why? And to what, the nether world? In the middle of my room no less!"

"If I had to guess… The Nexus."

"Harry." Ahri said rather weakly.

"Ahri? What's wrong?"

"I'm not… sure… I feel… strange. Memories..?" She continued incoherently until she quit responding altogether.

"Ahri? Ahri!" I yelled, both in my head and aloud.

Suddenly a thump. A mass and liquid fell onto the floor. I took out my wand as did Warden.

"What the hell is that?" Warden asked. The portal distorted, the light once again intensified, and a flash and another bang later the portal disappeared in white smoke.

I caught a glimpse of the mass that the portal dropped. For a minute I didn't understand what I was looking at, then realized it was a body. "It's a girl. Quickly, she's naked, grab that bed sheet," I told Warden.

"Ahri. Ahri?" I tried to call for her through the mental connection but there was no response.

The girl started to groan and move her head.

The body in front of me was young and covered in slimy juices.

"Crap my parents." I heard the SUV come around the corner.

Warden quickly picked up the girl and said, "It'd be bad if they found me here, worse to find me _and _her here. Stay in communications."

"Wait but the mess." I looked over the slime.

"Save as much as you can. If anyone asks, just say it was accidental magic," he shrugged.

"_Accidental magic_?" I looked at him incredulously.

With a loud _crack _he apparated away.

I looked at the mess in front of me. Slime and white powder adorned the floor. Warning from the ministry or not, I was going to use wandless magic to clean this.

The next day, a week before Hermione and I were to begin preparations to go to Hogwarts, Warden had managed to get a hold of me on a telephone call.

"The girl has woken up from her coma. I've been analyzing her and the slime vials you gave me at Lang. I also called your mom earlier. She'll be telling you soon about a special project I have for you. Did you figure out the Hallows?"

**"Yeah I used a broomstick..."**

**"Yes. Well... I'll come pick them up later. For now the girl is hungry. Man she can eat."**

A little later after that call my Mom indeed came to talk to me about the special project.

Lang Dgur was extremely understanding when we had to leave the school. Warden had talked to our parents and made sure to note that the school as an experimental education center would like to continue communication with Hermione and I regardless. I had made sure to play my part and help convince my parents in private that committing to Hogwarts and Lang Dgur in the summer was what I wanted. Hermione had insisted she wanted to do the same.

"See and you were afraid of school! Now you want to be there all the time," Dad smiled.

I was dropped off at Lang Dgur during the afternoon and met with Professor Luci. He took me to the entrance of the Grounds, which was a broom closet door. He had a key that when he used it on that same door revealed the true entrance to the wide open Grounds. Professor Luci loosened his tie. The sign he became Warden again.

"She's over here," he said.

We walked briskly to a facility next to the Grounds' tracks. It was a medical center and it housed the lone patient. She was watching television on a medical bed where she looked over at me and smiled.

"Harry!" She exclaimed. I was able to examine her in better lighting this time. She had bright white hair with red streaks that toppled past her shoulders and she was quite petite I thought. Her face looked familiar, though I couldn't put my finger on it.

"You know me?" I asked her.

"Duh! Of course I do!"

"You're…?"

She smiled widely. "Weird right? It's me! Ahri."

"You're joking..." I examined her further. Looking to make sure nothing was amiss. "You're younger? Can I see your back?"

She turned around and moved her patient's gown. It revealed a tattoo on her right shoulder blade. It was the constellation of Virgo. Based on the day I had learned Ahri's name had put it there as what I thought to be a sneaky Easter egg.

I sat in shock, "You _are_ Ahri… Do you know what happened to you, like how you got here?"

"She doesn't remember," Warden said behind me.

"Hey I can talk for myself now, thank you very much. But yeah, I don't remember anything Harry I'm sorry."

"Cool little thing though, watch this," Warden got out his wand and prodded her.

Her shape started to morph and her size decreased. Feathers quickly sprouted and covered her entire body. She then shrunk at a speed so fast that the blanket covered her head to toe.

I removed the blanket to find a white and red feathered owl had taken her place.

"She's an Animagus," Warden said flatly.

The owl was doing cartwheels and karate moves while we spoke when immediately she froze in the middle of a kick.

_Animagus ability unlocked. Input needed. _Ahri's voice rang in my head. As the voice stopped Ahri fell on her feathered back and looked up.

"What happened?" She asked.

A Realm screen popped up in front of me and had opened a keyboard. Above it read, "Animal Form."

"It's asking me to choose an animal form."

"What is? You mean the Library?" Warden questioned excitedly.

"Yes. I… I don't know what to pick."

"How about something cool and large and deadly?" Warden tried to contribute. "Like a basilisk!"

I typed that in.

"Invalid, it says."

"Damn, I'm guessing Phoenixes are out of the question too?"

I tried that in as well.

"It says it's invalid as well. I'm guessing magical creatures are out of the question."

"How about a lion? You know like Gryffindor? Or maybe a cheetah."

"It doesn't sound like me to be honest."

"A hawk?" Warden continued.

"Nah."

"A horse?"

"No."

"A wolf?"

"Can you stop I'm concentrating. Wait…"

Warden smiled. "Ah ha, you like the wolf thing don't you?"

"No. But I know what I want to be."

I typed in my animal, saw that it was valid and waited.

What felt like ice ran down my spine to the tips of my toes and fingers. A magical energy much like static electricity surrounded my being. My vision became narrow and clearer. A feeling appeared on top of my head, such as something like a hat. I grew large, my height growing eye level to Warden. Who looked stunned.

"I like it," Warden said.

Warden and I had gone down to walk around the track of the Grounds to talk some more. He was very amused by the turn of events.

"So you're saying that if I see certain abilities I can unlock them?"

"Well yes. Granted of course you understand what's happening. The Akashic Library works at a fundamental level like a very large, powerful recorder. Thing is if a subject happens to have an activation sequence, and you happen to learn it or see it, then the activation sequence is also recorded. The Library sorts those sequences into code. And those codes are what affects your Primer. Priming being an action sequence. And action sequences are completed and primed codes."

"So code is ammunition. The Library is a gun. And the Primer is the act of firing or the bullet impact?"

"Pretty much. Anyway, what do you think of your new, old friend?"

"Ahri? To be honest? I don't know."

"Well… you _could_ use an owl for school." Warden remarked, he continued walking but watched me from the side of his eye..

"Take her to school with me? Not only that but as an owl?" I asked aghast.

"It was just a thought," he sounded slightly offended.

"One: I'd have to go about thinking an excuse for how I found her. Two: she's not an actual bloody owl. She's a girl now Warden, you do realize this right?"

"Fine. Like I said, it was just a thought. What did you guys get for pets anyway?"

"Oh. Mom and Dad didn't exactly get us one. The list only _suggested_ having an animal. Mom really doesn't do pets. Calls them a chore, so she says. Hermione will eventually wear her down."

'"How do you figure?"

"She gets a cat named Crookshanks in our third year. Smart beast actually. He tortures Scabbers. It's fantastic. Most definitely making sure we get him again," I say, ecstatic at the thought of Peter being eaten by Hermione's orange feline.

"So have you figured out what you'll be doing?"

Not this again, "Yeah, I was going to take it one day at a time if you don't mind."

"Harry… you're doing what Dumbledore did." He was referring to my plan with Nova Potter.

"I know!" I sat at a bench. In my procrastination I was indeed doing exactly what Dumbledore did to me.

"It's hard isn't it? Lying to protect loved ones."

"Harder than I thought it would be. I kind of feel sorry for Dumbledore now. You know… I yelled at him in my fifth year. I thought I had it all figured out back then, what makes it even worse is that he was the last person I saw at the end…"

"You okay?"

"Yeah. I… I thought that maybe… maybe I made a mistake that day." My face was starting to get hot as I remembered. No one can know, I promised myself. Especially not Nova.

"You don't have to say anything."

I looked at Warden, thankful for his tact. I had described him as a young man with white hair, but today he looked like just a regular man. Perhaps it was how I was able to see now that behind his eyes lay experiences I couldn't imagine. For years he taught me; how to fight, how to survive, and how to build a secretly managed global empire. Yet I knew very little of him. He was often working as my proxy, distributing my Library's knowledge for my benefit or increasing the knowledge it contained.

What little I did know of him was restricted to our training and projects. Except this one time: He complained often of a feeling that restricted him. He couldn't explain it in detail but it seemed voices in his head often guided him to certain decisions. While he had mastered the ability to silence them for a short while, their insistent and needy attitude drove him quite wild most of the times. He smiled and brushed it off.

"Overall they're not good to have, but also not terrible. It's more like a nagging than anything. As soon as I do whatever they ask me to do they quiet down."

To me that sounded horrible, but no matter how I prodded him on this he discontinued the conversation.

"Look it's okay. It's a gift from the Nexus. You and I… we're here to do good. To change people's lives. Save them. If that requires sacrifice then voices in my head should be the least of our concerns."

We returned to Ahri's room once more to check on her.

"So how's she doing?" I asked.

" Asleep. A question: did you make any last minute updates to her personality?"

"Nothing that I can remember. She was patch 27.1." I made a habit of notarizing Ahri's changes and relaying them to Warden for second opinions and ideas. "Why? Was I the only one who noticed she's a totally klutz now?" I grew concerned from Warden's scowling.

"The vials you gave me, that slime? It's incubation liquid. My guess is... That day with the portal? That was her birth day or something. I got a readout that her age is 11 from my wand. Again I can only speculate. She told me that her memories tell her she was an AI once, your AI. So I believe her when she says she thinks she's Ahri. Also it helps her that she was affected at the same time by your Animagus skill unlocking. I wonder if at that moment… I think it was her accessing your thoughts again."

"You think she can read my thoughts?"

"I think she's the same as before. Just now she's got a body. It's the personality that's different. Younger, much younger. Almost like a child. Prior she was well versed, professional. Well now... well you saw. I took the liberty of adopting her by the way," he said offhandedly.

"You did what now?" Shocked, he disregarded my comment and continued.

"I don't know exactly what she is, but she's here now and we need to live with that. I'll continue to work on her and make sure she's going to be stable. From what you told me though, she only learns to be human by actual interactions with us. So I got her into Hogwarts as my kid."

"You sure about she can even do proper magic? I sensed her aura, she's got nothing." Indeed my magicule sensor couldn't get a single read off her.

Warden again disregarded me and said, "She is more powerful than she lets on. I've had a hypothesis that we're about to prove. I have feeling that her magical signature is hidden from you because her magic _is_ yours, or at the very least connected to you."

Before I can ask him to explain he waved his wand, "Clayabolis." A stream of blue orbs came out of my chest and moved towards Ahri. From Ahri, green orbs were streaming out from her. The orbs met fusing into a golden light. At this light orbs started to dance around one another and merging, but then separating and circled back.

"Interesting... I'll try to explain as best as I can. The first tests were inconclusive. At first I thought she had a magical core that was leaking. But magicule leaks don't form orbs. They spout out like a water hydrant. What I thought was a leak from her core was actually a process of transference and unsurprisingly it _would_ be transferring to you. It wasn't until a couple days ago though when those orbs started intermingling with blue ones. When it reached her she woke up. Do you understand? I think it was a start up, her coma was a result of me apparating away before your connection was complete."

"So we have some sort of magical sharing thing going on."

"A magical bond." Yawned Ahri. "You know I had a dream. My first one. Anyway, Harry took me to Hogwarts as an owl and I had funny wacky adventures with him and his friends."

My heart livened at the sight of Ahri for some reason. Perhaps it was the many years learning with her and traversing the Realm that I came to feel that she had become not just a really good assistant but my ultimate friend. Remembering all those days and nights she would sing to me and play music while I was a baby in my crib, bored out of my mind. And she did so much more, I needed to repay her.

"Well, we've thought it over. You won't be coming with me to school as an owl," I began.

She looked at me sternly and crossed her arms clearly agitated by the news.

"We thought of something better!"

"Like what?"

"You'll be coming with me as a student!"

**A/N: As far as OCs go I characters are pretty much set. There are of course OG characters yet to be introduced but they'll come on their accord. Year One of this story is something I'm trying really hard to quickly go through. You'll find that things will be accelerating rather quickly but I'll try my best to adhere to only summarizing OG book situations. And yes, when I use OG I mean Orginal Gangsta. I hope you liked this chapter if not fair enough leave a comment telling me to fuck off. But if you like it so far and want to continue reading this I really hope to expand the maturity of my story in time. You can imagine writing feelings for 11 year olds to be rather difficult let alone a 20 year old you got stuck in a baby's body. Do I erase his memories entirely? Do I not? If not does he get all of it or just some of it? I'm prefacing the story on the basis of recent isekai light novels and animes. I am neither a very good author let alone a Japanese author, or a good Japanese author, so I'm only making the story within what I had found to be my observations on the balances of power while writing a western styled prose. So forgive me if anything goes amiss. Again hoping you like it this is Shadow, until tomorrow. Or well, today. I have a habit of submitting these at Midnight for some reason.**


	7. Save Me

**Chapter VII: Things Change**

~Harry~

"Professor Lupin, there's got to be a mistake. It says platform 9 and 3/4 . There's no such thing. Is there?" Hermione asked, incredulous.

He smiled.

"Oh. It's like Diagon Alley isn't it?" Hermione was very excited, perhaps too excited to start the journey.

"You're very bright Hermione. Yes it's going to be concealed if but a bit differently," Lupin remarked.

I couldn't help but feel bittersweetness. My nostalgia ran rampant as I soaked the view of the train station but yet quiet anxiety took hold of me. I couldn't help but feel that going back to Hogwarts seemed… dire. Maybe it was because I knew what lie in wait there. But with all my foresight from the Akashic Library I had no means to see what actions needed to be done in order to get the best outcome for Nova Potter.

Regardless, I had simple goals in mind. The first one is ensuring that Nova Potter got to King's Cross. I even took considerable lengths to make sure we came around the same time as before.

Lupin had took us to a wall between platforms nine and ten.

"Let's wait a moment. Wouldn't want anyone to see us do this."

And we did. It didn't take a second before we heard a mother and five redheaded children walking up to us.

"Of course it's always packed full of muggles this time of year. Come on! Platform 9 and ¾ over here! Oh hello."

"Hello. I'm part of the Hogwarts faculty. Remus Lupin," Lupin introduced himself.

The woman looked over to my family. She smiled and greeted us back.

"Molly Weasley. These are my boys. And my one girl, Ginny."

It was so odd to see her again, and so small. Knowing I used to kiss her as older students back then had made it far too awkward for me to even look at her.

"I was going to demonstrate how to go into the platform, our friends here will be going in for their first time," Lupin explained.

"Oh no worries it's Ron's first time at Hogwarts as well." Ron stayed around the back of his brothers.

"Perhaps you wouldn't mind if my sons show you how it goes? It can be daunting at first."

"That'd be wonderful," Lupin said.

"Alright Percy you first, show them how it goes dear."

"Yes mom." He took a running start and headed straight for the wall. My family either grimaced or flinched at what seemed the moment of impact but became gob smacked when no such collision occurred.

As he went through the wall it elicited a gasp from Hermione.

"It's a concealment ward. It also keeps muggles from entering." Lupin explained.

"Alright Fred you next." Molly said to one of her twins.

"I'm not Fred!"

"I am! Honestly woman and you call yourself our mother," the other twin interjected.

"Oh sorry George."

"I'm only joking I am Fred."

Then George ran following his twin.

"Goodness those boys… Now who wants to go first?"

"Umm…" A girl with jet black hair and green eyes came forward. Petite and shy she seemed like a fairy. Nova Potter.

"Hello miss. Did you need any…" When Remus and I met he was asleep underneath his coat, dementors trying to steal my soul. It was interesting to see this type of reaction.

"Can you show me… how to…" she pointed to the wall.

"Yes, of course dearie. You just run through the platform here and you'll get to the other side."

Something about her made me feel uneasy. My heart was beating fast and it irked me that I couldn't understand why.

"Oh my quite a line. I never knew I'd bump into the Grangers," just in time I thought.

"You're kidding! Professor Luci." Dad said, surprised.

"I didn't know you were a wizard," Lupin whispered.

"I didn't know you were."

"Fair enough."

"I was just bringing my daughter. Her name is Ahri, I don't think you've met."

"Hello everyone. Dad it's quite crowded here. Maybe we can go inside first?"

"Ah. Good point. Go ahead you lot, we can follow you after you're done."

"Remember darling, just go straight at the wall. Best to do a bit of a run if you're nervous."

Nova did run. And disappeared behind the wall.

"Hermione, I think you should go next."

"Are you nervous?"

"A little bit." I lied.

"To be honest me too."

"Don't be worried darlings, it looked safe enough." Mom said somewhat unconvincingly.

She looked to Lupin who had heard the uncertainty in her voice said, "It's perfectly fine. I promise."

"Okay. Your father and I go will go in together, will that help you?"

Hermione and I both nodded in agreement. I think she was hyping herself.

"Okay… Come on Wendall."

"Me? Right…" he said reluctantly.

Holding each other's hands they did something interesting and had jumped into the wall disappearing into it.

"Okay I think I can do it." Hermione declared.

Without a moment's hesitation, she then ran really hard through the wall with her head looking straight at the floor and disappeared.

"After you?" I offered to Ron.

He obliged and thanked me. Following suit through the wall. Molly was next.

"How about it Harry?" Lupin asked.

"Seeing one more person do it should suffice."

He laughed. "Okay."

"Can you make sure he follows through with it?" Lupin asked Warden.

"Of course."

With that Lupin walked into the wall.

Now that we were alone, I faced Warden and Ahri, who were smiling.

"Do you have it?" I asked him.

"Yes. Here."

He gave me the two parcels that contained the Deathly Hallows. Warden immediately took out his wand ready to perform an invisible barrier charm. With trepidation we stood waiting to see if anything was to occur. When nothing did Warden relaxed.

"Must have been a one time thing," he said to himself.

"Good. How are you doing Ahri?" I was curious how she was taking walking in the world. Her first few steps were as an owl.

"Better now that I got to see you. Can we ride together over to Hogwarts?"

"Yes of course. If we can find seats, let's hurry."

"But you already have one in mind, don't you?" She winked at me. I did. But I needed to have Ron be the first person she talks to.

We all walked through the wall and met up with our party on the other side.

"You took a while," Hermione remarked.

"Sorry I couldn't help it. Making my brain think rushing past a wall as a good idea was difficult."

"I know what you mean but look!" Hermione said. She spun on her heels and pointed out the entirety of King's Cross station. It was… beautiful.

"We have to hurry, everyone's taking their seats now," Lupin said, helping with our luggage.

"If Harry didn't spend so long in the bathroom today we could've gotten here earlier."

"Mom could you say that louder? I don't think anyone heard you over the train."

"It's okay Harry. I'm your mom. I get to talk about my son's problems in the loo," she grinned.

As Lupin said goodbye to us he looked over where Nova was last seen. It was only for a glance, but in that moment I saw something in Remus that reminded me of Sirius.

"I hope you all enjoy Hogwarts. It's by far the best school I've ever been a pleasure to reside at." With that he left.

Last but not least I had a final moment to say goodbye to my parents. I was surprised as my dad got to his knee to look at Hermione and I. He was teary eyed and looked ready to burst.

"I'm going to miss you two. Stay safe, learn lots of things, and make good friends."

"I can't promise the first one, but I'll make sure to take care of Hermione."

He smiled slightly and turned to Hermione.

"Take care of each other, family… family is important." He said and embraced us. He hugged us both so hard I thought he'd never let go.

We hugged mom as well before we got into the train, which we barely were able to get on. I felt so happy at that moment. I looked back at Mom, she was on Dad's arm and they watched us, waving goodbye. Using a skill I had unlocked long ago, I opened the Realm and took a photo.

Everything sort of played out the same way it did last time, except now it was from a different perspective.

The twins, Fred and George, picked fun at Percy for being Prefect, as well as Ron for being a first year. The train carts had compartments that can fit six, but taking into account legroom only really meant you had room for four. Which also meant the tiny cabin were being taken urgently.

Friends were finding friends easily enough. It was the first years who were having trouble. Take Ron for example.

"There's no place to sit. Do you see Lee anywhere?" Fred asked George.

"Lee!"

"Sorry little bro, you'll have to go find somewhere else."

"But why can't I sit with you?"

"Why? Because you're a first year, prat. We can't be seen with you. Besides you should hang out with people your own age."

"Whatever. Umm… if we find an empty place you think we can share it?" Ron asked optimistically.

"Maybe I'm not even sure there is anywhere empty," I replied.

"Over here. Here's one for us Harry." It was a compartment that had a person in it already and I recognized him. It was Neville Longbottom.

"I guess I'll be finding on my spot then," I felt bad, but I needed him to find Nova.

"Sorry mate."

"It's okay, really." And went on his way.

"Is he not coming in with us?" Hermione asked, lifting her luggage into a slot next to the door.

I played it off, "He thought he saw another cabin that had more room."

Hermione stared at Ahri, who looked back with a huge smile. Hermione sighed.

"Hermione Granger. And you are?" Hermione asked Neville. Poor boy looked a fright.

"Sorry- I umm- Neville Longbottom..." he said as he fumbled with the toad, Trevor, in his hands.

This was going to be a fun trip, I can already tell.

"Oh no!"

"What's wrong?" Ahri asked.

"I lost Trevor!"

"You mean your toad?"

He nodded frantically. "My grandma's going to kill me."

"Don't worry Neville, we'll find him," said Hermione. She looked at me and I nodded in agreement.

"Yeah don't worry, we'll find him if we all look together." I said.

Having spent time looking in the compartment we decided to split in two. Hermione and I would go one way and Ahri and Neville the other. I already knew which way I wanted to go.

"We'll meet back here after we go through the rooms," I declared.

In agreement we started the search.

"Hermione it'll be quicker if I run down to the end and meet you in the middle."

"That makes sense, see you then."

As I went running down the corridor I looked back to see Hermione had gone into her first room. Perfect, I thought as that'll keep her busy as I get to check on Ron and Nova. I took out my cloak of invisibility and put it on when I got to a junction between the train cars. I walked up to the cart I had taken residence in my last life.

There she was: Nova Potter. Stupid heart of mine, beating irregularly again. I had to find out what that was about. As I turned the corner to make sure Ron was there with her, I had found out instead something horrifying.

A view out of my nightmares. Draco Malfoy sitting across from her.

_What the hell? _I thought.

_Something happen Harry?_

_Ahri? _I asked.

_Mhmm._

_You can still talk to me?_

_Appears so. Your mind is really loud, did you know that?_

_She's sitting with Malfoy and laughing! I'm glad I didn't blow my cover._

_It's okay. Not everything can go exactly the way it did back then. Maybe Ron waiting with us made him lose his chance to sit with her?_

_But with him? Where the bloody hell is he anyway?_

Again Nova smiled at Draco, a sickening feeling in the pit of my stomach made me want to curse him right there and now.

The bloody bastard was making her, which means me, laugh!

_You need to calm down Harry. _Ahri pleaded. _You're starting to make me mad and Neville is looking at me rather strangely._

_Okay. Find that calmness Harry. _I told myself. The train cart door opened at that moment and Hermione came out of it. _Oh bugger._

I retreated further out to make sure she had room for her to enter Nova's cabin.

Without so much as saying hi Hermione looked around the cabin and without seeing a toad sighed and asked, "Has anyone seen a toad? A boy named Neville's lost him."

"Neville Longbottom, is it?" A snigger later Malfoy said, "Don't even bother with him, my father says the Longbottoms are denser than a pack of marbles."

Nova looked concerned. "What do you mean?" She asked.

"I know you're new to all this, but you'll see that some wizarding families are better than others Potter," he said matter-of-factly. "You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort."

His smug face was very smackable, I thought. But I managed to drown out my rage. He's only eleven years old, I thought. Still I couldn't help thinking maybe just one good smack...

"I'm sorry Draco, but if that's how you feel about people I don't think we're going to be very good friends." Nova said politely, starting to stand up.

Malfoy looked shocked, and fumbled his next words, "But I'm only trying to help you. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I think you should figure out some of your priorities next time. Discrimination based on the basis of family ties, it's not fair. No offense of course. If you can apologize to-" Nova looked at Hermione.

"Oh. My name is Hermione Granger. We met earlier."

"Right! With your brother. And the Weasley's."

Malfoy looked shocked even once more but kept his mouth shut. What the hell I thought.

Nova looked back again at Malfoy. "If you can apologize to Hermione then I can forgive you."

Malfoy only stared at her, looking like he was contemplating actually apologizing. After a long pause, Nova got up.

"I'm sorry," she said sweetly as possible, "I'll have to sit somewhere else, but it was nice meeting you Draco."

Hermione looked awkwardly over at Draco then back at Nova. I saw Draco looking completely blindsided. His mouth was agape as if trying to throw up words.

"Do you guys have room at your cabin? Everyone else is full."

Hermione didn't hesitate a second, "Of course! It'll be cramped but you can be with us. Come I'll show you."

I stood, stunned at the events. And Malfoy looking equally as stunned sat back down and said, "Bloody hell…"

I retreated to a safe spot and took off the cloak. What the hell was that.

_That was interesting. _Ahri commented.

_You heard that did you?_

_Bits and pieces. It's really hard to follow that drama while talking to a group of girls about a missing dog._

_Umm… Ahri we're trying to find Neville's toad._

_Ooooooh._

When Trevor had been reunited with an ecstatic Neville we regrouped at the cabin.

A Hermione type of explanation later and we had gained a new buddy. I found that I couldn't stop trying to look her in the eyes. Awkward enough as it was, everyone else's eyes were on us.

"Is it me… or are you guys related?" Neville asked.

"What? No! Hermione's my sister," I said at once.

"Wait, you and Hermione are brother and sister? But you don't look anything alike."

"Well, it's because I'm adopted."

"Oh I'm sorry," Neville apologized.

"No, it's okay. As an orphan I'm glad to have been adopted," I laughed. At the corner of my eye I can see Nova look at me with an expression I couldn't make out.

"The resemblance _is_ uncanny I must admit," Nova said finally. "But if I had a brother I think would've known."

Trying to steer the conversation I turned to Neville. "How's your home life like?" I asked knowing exactly how it was.

"Oh it's good… I live with my Grandma. Please try not to meet her," he said rather quickly," I say that not because I don't love her. She's just kind of… tactless?"

"What happened to your mom and dad?" Ahri pressed. She no doubt gave me a look as if knowing what I was trying to do.

"Oh… my parents are in the hospital…" Neville said the last part almost inaudibly.

"We're sorry Neville, we didn't mean to pry," Hermione tried consoling him.

"No… umm… it's okay. I just…" he said timidly.

"Only say what you want Neville. We're all friends here." His eyes shot up and he gave me a look that said thank you.

"So Nova how about you?" I started.

"Me? What do you want to know?"

Hermione asked, "I heard from some people, that you're famous. No one said why though."

"Did they? Famous? That's disconcerting," Nova frowned. My first thought was that I understood though what she was going through. My second thought was that Nova Potter had a rather different vernacular than mine. I was curious to see how much more differences and similarities there was between us.

"I just found out that my parents were killed by a guy named Voldemort?"

Neville did a high pitched shriek. We all looked at him curiously.

"You guys must've been raised muggle-like. No one says that name. It's taboo even Grandma says so, and Grandma isn't afraid of things."

"Fear of a name, increases fear of the thing itself." I recited.

Hermione impressed asked, "Where'd you get that one?"

"It's an original," I replied smirking.

"Who was Voldemort?" Ahri asked.

Nova proceeded but cautiously so not to spook Neville again. However, even he got closer to hear her story.

"I was told he was a dark wizard who did a bunch of bad things to people. He killed my dad and then my mom. And would've killed me too. But I guess something went wrong? A curse rebounded and destroyed him they say."

"I don't know if it's any consolation. However, if you're anything to go by, I'd say you're parents were great people. And would be proud of you."

Nova looked at me thoughtfully when I said that, which made my heart stutter. Seriously, I thought what was going on with me?

She started to blush and look away, "Thank you."

Hermione quickly broke the silence by saying, "I read that Hogwarts sorts us into different Houses?"

Neville who had perked up answered, "Yeah, if there's a House to be in it'd be Gryffindor. Not that I'd be in it."

"Why's that?" Ahri asked.

"Well some of the best wizards of all time were in Gryffindor. Albus Dumbledore was one, he's the headmaster of the school."

"I'm sure you'll get in Neville," I said.

"I doubt it. Only those that are brave and courageous get into that House. I'm neither."

"Don't be surprised, I know you're plenty brave, if you believe in yourself you'll definitely get into it." I made sure to be doubly encouraging. Neville gave another faint smile. I hoped I planted the seed that would be his destiny.

_Heh. Seed_. Ahri laughed.

_I meant herbology you minx._

"Nova what about you? Have you figured out which House you'd like to be in?" Neville asked.

"To be honest I'm only just finding about the Houses."

"What about you, Harry?" Nova asked.

"Gryffindor no doubt about it."

"That was quick." Hermione said.

"I don't know I just have a feeling," I said smirking. "What about you sis, what House do you want to be in?"

"Oh, well I've been asking around prior, and I heard Gryffindor was the best house too. Although I wouldn't mind being in Ravenclaw. But my preference is most definitely Gryffindor."

"But Ravenclaw has books and clever people?" I teased.

"Books! And cleverness! There's more important things - friendship, bravery, and- you know what I'm going to stop talking now." Everyone started chuckling at her passionate proclamation.

The train ride afterwards became more lighthearted and cheerful after that. We were laughing the entire way, and I never remembered Neville being that open anytime in our first year last life ago.

Having good friends to start the year must be a difference maker. In that regard I worried for Ron. I hadn't seen him and didn't know where he could have possibly been. While it was nice having the company of everyone here, it was different without him.

"I haven't been able to practice magic yet I've been dying to try it. Do you mind Nova?"

"Sure."

"Okay… Oculus Reparo." As Hermione waved her wand in front of Nova's face, Nova's glasses started mending itself.

"Nice!" Neville exclaimed.

With a satisfactory grin Hermione noted, "I can't wait to learn more. I've read every book so far, memorized them all by heart," she remarked somewhat proudly.

A woman with a cart full of candy and snacks came by our door.

"Anything from the trolley, dears?"

Hermione and I looked at each other. Mom and Dad had given us a fair bit of money to spend.

But before anyone can get anything Nova stood up and looked at the cart.

She had taken out a handful of galleons and said to the lady, "I'll take the lot."

The lady surprised, went ahead and removed most if not all the candy she had from the trolley.

"Sorry and thank you," Nova said.

"No worries dear," she tapped the cart with a wand and the candy filled itself again. "See?"

"You didn't have to do that Nova," Hermione said.

"It's all right. I wanted to share, it's the first time I've been able to."

I remembered the first time I had done this for Ron. The feeling of having a friend for the first time. Seeing Nova's huge smile only made this odd feeling to hug her to intensify.

As the train went onwards and as the night started to descend, we went from seeing wide open fields to going through dark woods. The laughter subsided. Everyone had gotten some rest, save me. I enjoyed looking out at the trees which became more and more dense. The sun behind becoming redder and falling ever closer to the horizon.

Hermione and Ahri were sitting next to me. Both asleep, they had taken the liberty of using my shoulders as pillows. It was quiet except Ahri had been clucking like a chicken in her sleep every once in a while. Each cluck making me want to laugh. Hermione had ended up or rather down to my lap. I pet her bushy hair as she slept, eliciting a couple sleep talking sessions from her, "Harry I don't like that lasagna," as an example.

I watched Nova however, wake up. She yawned and looked over at me.

"Must be nice having a pillow," she said.

"Can you imagine _being_ the pillow?" I replied.

She chuckled. "Let me rephrase. Must be nice having _you _as a pillow."

"I am pretty soft."

We laughed. A whistle from the train woke everybody up. Groans from other cabins could be heard as the sleepy bodies started rising.

"We should start putting on our uniforms. I think we're getting close," Hermione remarked.

We all agreed with her and we all started taking out our uniforms taking turns to the loo to change.

Eventually, the train came to a stop at a station. A huge man with a figure I can never ever forget, Hagrid, was standing with a lamp in hand at the edge of the platform.

"That man's huge!" We would hear students say.

"First years with me!" Prefects were shouting. I can see Percy starting to direct us to Hagrid.

"Alright, everyone; follow me!" Hagrid said to the group.

As we started walking I caught a glimpse of the carriages the older students were getting on.

**Black as night, corpse like and ominous looking horses pulled the carriages. I knew Neville saw them as well.**

**"It's okay. They're friendly," I told him. He took me at my word and continued walking with me.**

Suddenly a Realm screen popped up reading it said, "Skill Unlocked; Thestral Discipline. Lvl 1."

I mentally shut off the Realm and continued walking. I will have to see the skill description later.

The night was cool as we headed towards a shore of a huge lake; the Black Lake, boats with lamps were placed at a dock where we were directed to get on them.

The five of us had gotten into a boat that Hagrid was on.

No one rowed the boats as before, we were going towards a castle whose lights danced and reflected off the lake's water.

Hogwarts.

"It's so beautiful." I overheard Nova, Hermione, and Ahri say.

All that I could keep thinking about was how I was finally back home. Nostalgia aside; the anxiety and excitement of the fact that I was here again, didn't stop me from remaining clear headed. I was ready to face Voldemort once more.

**A/N: Nothing to report. Next chapter some time later today. Let me know how you like it.**


	8. Allow Me To Introduce Myself

**Chapter VIII: Bait and Switch**

~Harry~

I don't know if it was because it had been 11 years since I last seen Hogwarts but having stepped in for the first time in forever released a calming feeling over me.

The aesthetics of the walls, the sounds of footsteps that echoed in the halls, and most importantly the knowledge I get to re-engage with the people at Hogwarts eased my nerves. I would save them all I concluded from the demon that had infiltrated my precious school.

The troop of first years followed Hagrid who took us from the lake's docks up the trail to the castle. We entered and reached the stairs where we had stopped at the entrance of Hogwarts' Great Hall. It was there where Professor McGonagol had waited for us.

"Hello Professor!" Hagrid said in his usual happy demeanor.

"Good evening Hagrid. I hope the trip across the river was satisfactory?"

"Only one person fell in this time," Hagrid smiled.

"My, that must be a record." She eyed all of us before starting again, "Welcome first year students. Before we begin, we will be meeting at the Great Hall where we will sort you all into your Houses, a Hogwarts tradition that has endured for a _millenia_. _Please_ try to stay as polite as possible when you are called up. When I call your name; you shall come forth and I will place the Sorting Hat over you and you will be sorted into your Houses. The Sorting Hat is never wrong when it chooses your House. If you are displeased with it's decision I assure you, you shall prosper one way or another. But there are no exceptions. Afterwards when everyone is sorted in, our Headmaster will have a short word and then we will eat. Follow me!"

News of food uplifted the students and we hurried along towards the Great Hall with vigor.

The doors were already opened, students were already seated on four large tables. The tables and students wore matching colors, and each table was separated by the color. The colors were red and gold, black and yellow, blue and bronze, and green and silver.

I glanced over to where the teacher's resided. Dumbledore sat in the middle, imposing as ever. Snape was also there, intimidating as possible. A curious expression on his face, his sights' trajectory I was sure on Nova Potter. Every other Hogwarts Professor, save for one Professor Trelawney, was there as well as I remembered it.

As we were going down I heard Hermione tell Ahri and Nova, "It's not real, the ceiling, it's been bewitched to look like the night sky. I read about it in _Hogwarts, A History." Classic Hermione, _I thought.

McGonagol led us down to the base of the stairs and took out a piece of parchment. Beside her a stool and the Sorting Hat, she started to read from the list.

I remember who was first and I looked over her. I readied my Realm's photo skill.

"Hermione Granger!"

I took numerous photos of her shocked expression. She shook off her nerves, however, quickly and proceeded to the chair.

"You can do this, relax." She told herself.

McGonagol placed the hat over her when Hermione sat down. For four minutes the hat remained, motionless.

Hermione's eyes were moving with a deep expression and thoughtfulness. I knew what was happening. That she was talking to the hat, as it gauged who she was, and where she wanted to go. I could only guess as to what the ancient artifact was telling her. Nothing was amiss, or so I thought. Hermione shed a single tear. It was shocking and everyone started to murmur.

Hermione quickly rubbed her face and looked on defiantly.

That did not happen last time.

"Gryffindor!" The hat called out.

Everyone was still a bit perturbed, those in the back who were incapable of seeing Hermione started to clap. I clapped the hardest. Eventually Gryffindor House started to roar it's signature round of applause as Hermione jumped off the stool and headed straight to their table. Expressions of congratulations echoing from the students. Slytherin table did not clap.

I looked behind at Hermione. She was looking sadly at me.

"Draco Malfoy!"

The white haired git went and sat at the stool. It was not even a second as the hat touched his head when it shouted, "Slytherin!"

Slytherin table erupted in cheers.

"There's not a witch or wizard who hasn't gone bad that wasn't a slytherin," I heard Ron remark behind me.

"Susan Bones!"

I wondered why we didn't do the sorting alphabetically.

Everything went rightly. Every student being placed in their proper Houses. Ahri , Nova, and I were the last ones.

"Ahri…" McGonagol paused," Nexus. Ish. Aus. Holden?"

With a huge smile Ahri skipped to the chair.

"Did I get that right my dear," McGonagol asked.

"Yes, Professor. Fantastic job."

She placed the hat on her.

As the hat touched her a ringing in my ears occurred, followed by static. Ahri looked equally as uncomfortable. It then subsided.

I heard whispers and I concentrated on it but it remained beyond my ability to hear it.

The hat took a second and declared, "Gryffindor!"

Applause as she took off the hat.

_What was that? _I asked.

She took a moment to look at me.

_Be careful Harry. The Hat is very powerful._

With that she sat down.

"Nova Potter!"

Everyone started to murmur again. Except this time all eyes, students and faculty shifted in their seats.

A pressure I once had placed on me.

"Good luck!" I said to her.

"Thank you!" She whispered back, her eyes expressed she was thankful for the support.

As she got into the chair she couldn't help but look extremely anxious. With the hat over her a whirlwind of emotions flashed across her face.

It was four minutes for her as well, before I saw her chanting under breath. I knew the words I said before but they were much different than what she seemed to be wording, it wasn't _not slytherin_.

"Gryffindor!"

A huge applause from the room minus slytherin house erupted.

"WE GOT HER!" You can hear the Weasley twins cheer.

As she smiled ruefully, she headed towards the table.

"Harry Granger!"

It was my turn. I walked to the stool confidently, knowing my place in this world. As I came closer to Dumbledore I caught his eye. He looked at me, as if seeing a ghost. And then I turned to Snape, who gave me the deadliest of stares. My former father's image in front of him once more.

As the hat was being placed on my head I sat prepared for something, anything. Ahri's words at the back of my mind.

Instead nothing happened. For a minute.

A Realm screen popped up.

_Nexus artifact detected._

_Oh no. _I thought.

_Skill unlocked; Transcommunications. Lvl 1._

I saw the level system once more and found it odd.

_Ah, Harry Potter. It's nice to be on your head again. And in it. I stand by what I said, you would've done well in Slytherin._

_Like I told you before, you're wrong._

_But not this time._

_What?_

_You're not who you used to be. Brave, courageous, but cunning, and scheming. Even your name is different. Your secret efforts scream Slytherin._

_I don't want to be in Slytherin though. _I thought aggressively.

_No. No. No. You can help more people this way. A chance it seems, of one life time. _

_Please don't. _It can't be I was so sure the hat would take my choice into consideration.

_Not this time. This time, the Story demands this. No, this time around I'm making you…_

"Slytherin!"

The Slytherin table erupted in cheers. But I continued, sitting where I was, even after McGonagol took the hat off.

"Mr. Potter take a seat."

"But- I'm not supposed to be Slytherin."

"Like I said before; no exceptions."

Having apparently expressing horror, I churned my face back to something less rude as I got back to the Slytherin table.

I sat down.

"Good man, you've got into the best House. Congratulations!" Draco Malfoy commented. He extended his hand.

And I shook it…

No. This was wrong.

Dumbledore stood up and walked to the chair. He waved wand and turned it into a podium. I noted his wand was the same as mine. Two Elder Wands on this planet. Fantastic.

"Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words…" The old man's speech faded in the background, my head spinning. I saw the looks of my new housemates. Blonde haired Malfoy, Zaine, Crabbe, and Goyle next to us. My heart was beating irregularly again, so hard that I thought it'd pop out of my ribcage.

"... Nitwit! Blubber! Oddmen! Tweak! Thank you."

"He's a bit mad- isn't he?" Malfoy laughed.

"He's a genius," Daphne Greengrass said, "one of the greatest wizards in the world. But yeah, he's daft as potatoes."

"Talking about potatoes," Crabbe said.

Food had appeared on our plates and table. Signifying the start of the feast.

I looked back at Gryffindor House where Ron, Ahri, Nova, and Hermione sat laughing and eating. I caught a glimpse of Hermione, who waved at me.

"Best not consort with them, Gryffindors are all blockheads I heard," Goyle say.

Everyone around the table laughed at that. Except Malfoy…

"You're a blockhead if you think I won't be talking to my sister!" I half yelled.

The table looked at me.

"Sorry, not my fault your sister got into the wrong House."

I was furious. My hand turned into a fist, and I wanted very much to plant it into Goyle's mouth.

"Maybe they're not all bad!" Malfoy said surprisingly.

"I met the Potter girl. She could be an ally."

"Scheming again Draco?" A girl named Pansy Parkinson quipped.

"Perhaps… You know what I mean Harry?"

I looked at Draco Malfoy. _Was he acting?_

"Just I don't need anybody to tell me what to do. Let alone who I can see."

"Fine. It doesn't matter if you go fraternizing with the enemy," a second year slytherin boy said.

"We're enemies?" Zaine asked.

"Extremely. Those red baboons will try their hardest to knock you down, watch you'll see Harry. Even your Sister will try it."

At that I stabbed my fork into the table. Eliciting looks from people even the other tables.

"Bathroom." I simply said and got up.

I left the Great Hall and was walking towards the bathroom when I slumped into the wall.

This… this isn't what was supposed to happen.

I felt like I was missing something. An answer that looked me straight in the eye, but I was too oblivious to it, too scared to see. I sunk to the floor and let out a frustrated cry.

**A/N: I might take a quick break to write out the next one. Time to go out and about and stretch my bunions, and fat arse.**


End file.
